A/N: I have always been fervently pissed that Joss Whedon killed off Jenny Calendar. This is my attempt to write this wrong and heal my own trauma. Part 1 of 3.
Jenny
As she raced through the darkened halls of Sunnydale High, Jenny Calendar understandably wished that she could start this damned day all over again. For starters, she wouldn't have stayed after dark in the building that she was likely going to be murdered in, which now seemed a bit foolish with a soulless, sociopathic vampire on the loose with a very specific hit list. And Jenny would have chosen an outfit more conducive to fleeing rather than wooing, especially since, as Angelus's footsteps pounded closer and louder behind her, it was likely to be the last outfit she'd ever pick out, and not even just with Rupert in mind but entirely, personally pick out to put on her body. Which was going to be stiff and cold and unfeeling and posed in some horrific coffin and lowered into the ground and oh my god she would rot and decay and turn to dust and be...nothing. Another name on a headstone, another grave in a cemetery, another soul lost to the hellscape that was Sunnydale.
But most importantly, Jenny realized as Angelus caught up to her on the stairwell, perfectly framed against the half-moon window - one of the few things she'd ever really liked about the school, apart from maybe oh everything since all of the things she had liked or disliked or pretended to dislike were about to come to an abrupt halt - was that if she could do this day again, even if she kept the same dress, because Rupert had looked at her rather sweetly when he saw her in it, and even if she did stay late, because this damned curse wasn't going to translate itself, she would get over herself and actually, well, grow a pair. She'd tell Willow that she was the brightest student that Jenny ever had taught and that she's noticed all of the times that Willow had gone out of her way to be kind and sweet to her during their long nights in the library and even the painful recent weeks of her shunning and that she'd appreciated it, and Willow herself, more than she'd ever admitted. She'd tell Buffy that she was truly sorry, not necessarily for what she couldn't have known or even what her family had done generations before her that she'd had no control over, but for Buffy's deep pain at losing someone she had loved and having to watch him turn into the very opposite of who he had been, and that Jenny had only ever felt empathy and compassion toward Buffy, this seventeen year old with the weight of the world on her shoulders and few who realized it. And Jenny would tell Giles, Rupert, her Rupert, that she'd meant every word of her unintended slip that afternoon. That she had fallen in love with him so completely and suddenly that it had warmed her and terrified her all at once, and that the first thing she'd thought when she realized the depth of her feelings was just how awful this was all going to be when the truth came tumbling out, because it always does, and now it was going to be even worse because Angelus was going to kill her and Rupert, oh god Rupert, and the kids, the next time any of them heard her name it would be with "killed" or "murdered" but most definitely "dead" all in the same sentence. And the enormity of that realization hit Jenny squarely in the chest as she gasped with the mounting horror of what was to come, immediately for her, later for the rest of them.
This was the end, she thought frantically as Angelus's hand tightened around her neck. It was over, she was over. Jenny tried to clear her mind and face the inevitable bravely, letting her final hopes that one of them, any of them, would stumble upon the curse, saved on disk and buried in her wreck of a classroom, that the kids would manage to stay alive until graduation and move somewhere, anywhere that there wasn't a constant risk of death and loss of loved ones, and that Rupert wouldn't be too scarred or guilt-ridden by the loss of her to not be able to live the life she'd never have. As Angelus bid farewell and shifted his grip to make his final move, Jenny Calendar's fervent final wish was that wherever she was going, she wouldn't see any of them, the kids and Rupert - the people she loved, she realized achingly - anytime soon.
But it was at that moment that Angelus's grip loosened as he hissed angrily in unexpected pain. And Jenny found, to her amazement, that her final wish hadn't come true in the slightest.
-BtVS-
The ensuing scene was chaotic enough for a normal person, but for Jenny, who had been simultaneously facing the reality of impending death and experiencing the beginning stages of said death by way of a vampire-level vise grip on her neck, it was damn near impossible to process. She had been quite literally milliseconds from being no more, but here was Angelus cursing with a stake driven through his hand by...what? A crossbow, she realized belatedly as she could now shift her head and actually take in the melee before her: Rupert, looking murderous himself, said crossbow in his hands, Buffy, charging forward to kick a disoriented Angelus in the chest, and a shaken Willow, who looked possibly more shell-shocked than Jenny herself felt but had locked eyes on Jenny and was screaming for her desperately.
Jenny shook herself from her daze and ducked, stumbling to get away as the Buffy and Angelus show kicked off before her. Angelus made a grab for her as Willow screamed again and Buffy intervened, deftly stepping between them to deflect Angelus with one hand and send Jenny flying with the other.
"One of you get her," Buffy ordered, and Jenny was surprised to find a little bit of hurt creeping up at that. She'd nearly died, she reminded herself, and she hadn't because somehow, in some crazy sort of miracle movie plot twist, Buffy and the cavalry had managed to show up in the nick of time. What did it matter what tone Buffy took during the rescuing, as long as said rescue actually took place? But just as quickly as this all flashed through Jenny's thoughts, Buffy cast a look at Jenny over her shoulder, just for a second, before she and Angelus were back at it again, but Jenny could see the pure fear - childlike fear, even - in her gaze. Maybe with a little bit of guilt thrown in too.
She could hardly believe that all of this was actually flying through her mind, just as quickly as her body, apparently, when hurled by a Slayer, because suddenly she was a few feet from the fight rather than in the thick of it, and there were arms around her and hands grabbing at her. "I've got you," Rupert was saying in her ear before she suddenly found herself lifted in his embrace, Willow's hands gently shoving at her, almost as if to make sure that Jenny was actually there. "Willow, Willow, we have to go. Now, I tell you!" The urgency in his tone was enough to drive Jenny deeper into his arms as they took off, Jenny in Rupert's grasp and Willow sprinting beside them.
"We shouldn't leave her," Willow cried out desperately as they ran. "Buffy might need help."
"It's the best chance we have," Rupert answered as Jenny began to piece together the darkened halls. The library. They were going to the library. The sound of breaking glass echoed behind them.
"The window," Willow shrieked now. "One of them went through the window."
Or both of them, Jenny thought grimly. Not that any of those scenarios were great or made for good odds. "Put me down," she urged. "I can run, I'm just slowing you down now." Jenny knew she was right when Rupert gently but quickly eased her out of his arms, barely letting up his pace but making sure to hold on to her elbow, essentially keeping her in front of him. They were almost there…
"Go, go, go!" Jenny nearly yelped in surprise even as she recognized Buffy's voice behind them and heard the pound of her footsteps join with theirs. "I kicked him out the window, he hit the ground hard."
"Good." Rupert pushed the doors to the library open, pulling Jenny with him as the girls came in on their heels. "That buys us some time." He scooped Jenny up once more, so quickly that she could only startle and stammer half-baked sentences before he was putting her down again, sitting her on top of one of the tables and ordering Willow over with them.
"We need to do the ritual," he explained, smoothing her hair quickly as Willow climbed up next to her. "Willow, you do not leave Ms. Calendar's side. Not even for a moment. Do you understand?" Willow nodded and pulled out a cross from beneath her coat, putting it between them on the table for easy access. "Buffy and I will take care of every possible way in. We'll be safe here." Jenny offered him what she suspected was a rather tremulous smile even though she'd aimed for grateful and appreciative, and she felt her heart actually physically seize as Rupert reached for her again, kissing her forehead gently before easing away.
Jenny watched as Rupert bolted toward the door again, Buffy hot on his heels, already reaching for the little book she'd given him earlier that he...had tucked in his pocket during the latest battle of life and death? Jenny bit back a laugh at the absurdity of it all...Rupert chanting over a door with Buffy acting as the muscle beside him, reading from a book that he'd had stowed away in his pocket like the librarian he was while his girlfriend - ex-girlfriend? She wasn't sure where they had landed on that - nearly had her neck snapped before him. Jenny felt herself shudder noticeably as the events of the last hour, arguably the last few weeks, finally caught up to her. Shock. She could feel it seeping through her pores and spreading out from her veins, dulling her senses and putting her horribly on the edge of her skin all at once.
Jenny was startled back to her no-less-terrifying reality as Willow tentatively touched her knee. "You okay, Ms. Calendar," she asked worriedly, and Jenny followed her gaze to Rupert and Buffy as they methodically yet frantically moved throughout the library, seemingly covering all of their bases with possible ways in. They would be here all night, Jenny realized, trying to focus on the black and white of the here and now rather than the dull roar that was the near-death experience pawing at the back of her skull. Yes, they would be here all night, until they could regroup tomorrow in the light of day and come up with a better, safer strategy to avoid future near-death experiences. Or actual death experiences. Or anything involving death whatsoever. And Jenny was guessing that the chanting-spells-over-every-possible-entrypoint organized dance that was currently happening before her was their best attempt at being thorough in light of the damned "Welcome Vampires" slogan plastered on the entrance to the school. What were the odds?
Jenny realized a bit belatedly that Willow was probably waiting on a response, and that typically if one was asked if she was okay after nearly having her neck snapped by a vampire, a response using actual words would be required to reassure the questioner that she was, in fact, okay. Or okay as she could be in terms of actually being alive to give said response. She opened her mouth to reply, but what came out was unexpected.
"I...I don't know," Jenny answered instead, honestly but unsure. "I...I suppose I'm okay if I'm sitting here and I'm not...dead on the stairs with my neck snapped. But...I guess I don't really know." Her immediate relief at her honesty lessened a little when she looked over at Willow, taking in her long red hair and sweet face and colorful outfit, and realized that these were not the words to speak to a kid. A seventeen year old kid, but a kid nonetheless. And a kid that had at best completely distrusted her and at worst completely hated her up until possibly the moment of what was intended to be her untimely death. Jenny was mentally berating herself when she felt Willow's hand creep gently into her own, with Willow shifting just a touch closer on the table until they were pressed comfortingly together side by side.
"You can lean on me, you know. If...if you want to. I won't let you fall." Willow looked over Jenny carefully, and Jenny felt herself wanting to duck a little from the scrutiny, hide herself from the looks and the judgment and the probing eyes just as she had been doing all of these weeks. But she forced herself to meet Willow's gaze, remembering her regrets as she had run for her life. No time like the present, right?
Jenny held Willow's hand just a little tighter. "I would, but we're a bit mismatched, height-wise," she said carefully. "Why don't you lean on me instead and we'll call it even?" She felt an unexpected rush of relief coupled with an overwhelming urge to finally break down and cry as Willow accepted her invitation, shifting so that her head was tucked softly against Jenny's, their hands still intertwined. She'd miss this, she realized. Not that she'd ever had...this before, with Willow or any of the kids, but the possibility of this. That they would ever see her as more than just Giles' girlfriend or the computer science teacher or the other adult who researched demonology alongside them. That she'd manage to actually do some good, for once, for someone rather than sitting around waiting and watching, ensuring that someone else stayed miserable for all eternity. That she could finally be the adult that she'd never had and desperately needed when she was their age.
"You're shaking like a leaf," Willow commented, reaching her other hand over so that she could hold Jenny's now-trembling hands in both of hers. "I always wondered about that saying," she continued in what was a clear attempt to be conversational and casual even as the tension of the ongoing danger lingered around them. "Why a leaf? Like, how does that make sense?"
"I think it's about the wind," Jenny managed, still struggling but appreciative of Willow's subtle efforts to bring her back down to Earth. "Like how the wind blows the trees and makes the leaves move?"
"I guess that works" Willow agreed. "But I wish we had a blanket or something though. You're probably in shock and you could use some getting warm. Maybe Giles has something in his office."
Although Willow made no move to get up off the table, Jenny felt an immediate panic at the thought of being left alone in the dark, even as she could hear Buffy and Rupert's murmuring from not that far away. What was taking them so long? "You're keeping me warm enough," she commented instead, hoping Willow would stay put. "Thank you," she added, a bit softer this time, dipping her head a bit so that she could murmur directly near Willow's ear. She flashed back to the previous spring and that awful prom night, standing in the wreckage of the library after she and Giles had fought to free Willow from the monsters below, then walking out into the spring night air with Rupert and their ragtag collection of teenagers after the world had somehow managed to keep spinning. Willow had approached her a bit shyly as they'd all made to split up into separate cars and head to the Bronze for their promised good time and well-deserved celebration.
"I'm glad you're a part of the club," Willow had said, so softly that Jenny had to duck her head close to Willow's to even hear her, just as Willow had reached out to squeeze her hand in thanks. "I would have been sucked right down into slime-land if it wasn't for you."
Jenny had smiled as she registered Willow's words from earlier in the evening and remembered her own indignant reply. She'd hugged Willow then without even really thinking about it, surprising the both of them and probably their little gaggle of onlookers, too. "What are computer science teachers for," she'd joked. "if they can't help you save the world and pull you out of the Hellmouth if needed." Jenny had pulled away then, feeling a little shy herself, but was touched as Willow's hand stayed firmly in hers as they continued the walk to the cars. They were kids, she'd thought desperately that night as she held Willow's hand in an easy but reassuring grip, watching Buffy in her white gown and damp curly hair and little girl cheeks walk closely with Angel up ahead and hearing Xander making idiotic remarks to an exasperated Giles and Cordelia behind them. Slayers and vampires and demons and the apocalypse aside, they were all just kids. It was awe-inspiring and horrifying all at once, these babies, someone's babies, fending off the end of the world in prom dresses and overalls and fuzzy backpacks.
And here they were doing it all over again, Jenny thought as she felt herself drift toward that familiar path of despair. But she let the feeling of Willow against her ground her, keeping her tethered to the reality she was teetering on the edge of and had come so close to being ripped away from.
"I'm glad you're safe," Willow replied. "I...I never would have wanted anything to happen to you. I would have missed you if...if."
"I would have missed you, too," Jenny answered honestly. "I would have missed all of you. I never wanted any of this to happen. And I wouldn't have wanted you all to suffer if he...if Angelus had actually…"
Now Willow seemed to be the one shaking. "I've missed you all along," she confessed, the words tumbling out. "I know I see you in class but it just hasn't been the same and I've just...I miss you, you know? And Giles hasn't been Giles and Buffy's been all lost and confused, and I know it's because of Angelus and not you, because it really seems silly now because it wasn't your fault…" Jenny squeezed Willow's hand as her voice turned thick and tremulous. Come on, Jenny. Be the adult here.
"I know that it's been hard on everyone," Jenny said, choosing her words carefully. "And...what happened tonight doesn't mean that you all no longer have the right to be angry, or for me to not have to work to earn back your trust. But for what it's worth, I do care about you and I have missed you, all of you. I wanted so badly to make it right for all of you." She felt a small measure of accomplishment that she'd managed what seemed absolutely unthinkable just a few days prior, when untangling a centuries-old course was more palatable than swallowing her pride and actually saying the words that she'd finally just uttered aloud to Willow to all of them, especially Rupert and Buffy. Maybe there was something to this near-death experience thing afterall.
"I care about you, too," Willow responded easily, and with so much genuineness and goodness that Jenny felt her throat tighten up with emotion. "And you don't have to work to win back my trust, because you already have it. And I...I hope you can trust me, too. And not just to, like, sub for your class again if you're late or you can't come in, because I'd really, really love to do that some more but just...like, trust me for anything, I guess."
"Can I trust you with a secret then?" Jenny couldn't believe she was actually sitting on a library table, joking with a teenager mere minutes after nearly dying a brutal death, but she'd had stranger days in Sunnydale. Willow tiled her ear closer to Jenny's lips to listen. "I would have missed you most of all."
"Nuh uh," Willow teased back just as quietly. "As flattered as I am, Ms. Calendar, I think you mean second most." And Jenny followed Willow's slow turn of her head toward Giles who was watching them appraisingly from across the room.
"Second most what?" Willow and Jenny jumped simultaneously as Buffy materialized in front of them, first aid kit in hand. Willow just shook her head and Buffy shrugged unconcernedly. "Giles wants to hang crosses in the windows," she explained. "Even though the spell is out there and hopefully doing it's unwelcoming thing. But Giles says it's a public place so it might not be completely safe. Will, maybe you could help him so I can patch up Ms. Calendar's neck?"
Jenny knew a peace offering when she heard one, and from Willow's careful detangling from her, she could tell Willow knew it also. Still, she was surprised, but supremely pleased, when Willow gently hugged her around her waist, squeezing just for a moment before letting go and climbing off the table to head tiredly toward Giles. Jenny caught Willow's eye before she turned away, smiling gratefully as a sort of understanding blossomed between them. Willow was hers, she realized then. Just as Buffy was Rupert's, Willow, somehow, maybe even without the two of them realizing it, had become hers. And Jenny could only send up some sort of prayer or thanks or blessing or whatever you wanted to call it, that she'd had the chance to untangle even this one small thing in just this short amount of time after her life was supposed to have ended. But as she took stock of Buffy's shifting eyes and nervous hands and trembling lips, Jenny realized that it wasn't likely to be the only revelation of the night.
Jenny watched quietly as Buffy perched on the edge of the table on the side opposite of where Willow had sat. Everything about Buffy, from her solemn expression and neutral gaze, her careful position on the edge of the table angled toward Jenny but not next to her, even the nervous twisting of her hands on the handle of the first aid kit, was opposite of Willow, Jenny thought, not that it just stopped there. Jenny had previously chalked it up to actually having taught Willow in class, but there had always been a contrast in how she'd related to the two girls, although careful adult distance had sort of been an underlying theme in both. Willow was the kind of kid who would stop by her classroom during her free periods and offer to grade papers or work on extra credit, the one who often would wordlessly hand Jenny the book she needed or a pen or even a cup of coffee as they researched in the library. Buffy was friendly, prior to the whole Angel's soul disaster, but cautiously so. She was never excluding of Jenny and seemed to avoid playing the "Slayer versus girlfriend" card between her and Giles, which Jenny could acknowledge and appreciate, but she was distant all the same. The only time that Jenny could honestly remember Buffy showing real, honest emotion to her and not necessarily just around her or in front of her was after Ted had lay smashed to pieces on Buffy's floor and Jenny and Giles had rushed over for damage control. Granted, it might have had something to do with Giles being on painkillers for the stake Jenny had lodged in his thigh and out of commission for anything requiring more than basic responses, but Buffy had looked at Jenny almost trustingly as she took charge and directed Willow and Xander to help her in dismantling the parts. And she seemed to not only tolerate, but welcome when Jenny had put an arm around her shoulders in some attempt at reassurance. But within a few weeks that had all gone quite literally to hell. And so Jenny sat and watched, mostly curious but with a little trepidation, as Buffy stared back at her with the same feelings mirrored in her eyes.
Jenny flinched violently as Buffy lifted her right hand in the direction of her neck. "Sorry," Jenny mumbled, a bit embarrassed. "I didn't mean that, it just…"
Buffy seemed a little uncertain herself, a stark contrast to her usual confidence and vigor. "No, I'm sorry," she offered. "You clearly don't want someone else coming at your throat. Pretty understandable after the night you've had."
Jenny tried for a smile. "I'm fairly sure you aren't going to try to break my neck. So I don't mind, really." She was surprised to see Buffy's eyes mist over, but that didn't even match the pure shock that flooded through her as Buffy, slowly but determinedly, reached for her again. Jenny felt her breath hitch as Buffy softly brushed her hair back off of her neck and collar bone, then traced what were sure to be visible marks already blooming at her throat, almost sort of petting her in a weirdly soothing sort of way.
"Ms. Calendar," Buffy said softly. "You've got to be hurting. These already look painful."
Jenny opened her mouth to offer what would probably be another minimizing sort of statement but thought better of it. Buffy wasn't one to showcase her vulnerability, and Jenny suddenly had a sense that dodging Buffy's offering with an impassive, bland "I'm-the-grownup" reaction was only going to put them right back where they had started. Just like with Willow, there was only one path forward.
"It's definitely starting to hurt," she admitted, meeting Buffy's eyes and letting her see the truth in her own. "I guess I didn't really notice until the adrenaline wore off."
"That happens to me sometimes, too," Buffy confessed, reluctantly bringing her hand back from Jenny to rifle through the first aid kit in her lap. "I mean, I heal pretty quickly, obviously, but sometimes, until I do, I'm just so sore and everything feels like a giant bruise." She found one of those fancy gel ice packs, probably one of the few things in the kit that Jenny guessed would actually do her any good, and cracked it before reaching up to gently hold it against Jenny's throat.
It was then that Jenny noticed the blood on her hairline. "Buffy," she chided, blushing a little when she realized how maternal of a tone she'd unexpectedly taken. She chanced a brush of her finger around the cut, feeling as Buffy tensed beneath her fingers. "You should have said something. You're bleeding. You must be hurting, too."
Now it was Buffy's turn to look Jenny right in the face. "A little," she admitted. "But not much. Not like he...not like you."
Jenny saw the moment for the opportunity it was and leaped. "That doesn't matter," she said, forcefully but without a lot of heat or chastising behind it. "It's not a contest about hurting the most. Any hurt, big or small or anything in between...it's all valid. And there's all different ways to hurt, and to cause it and try to bounce back from it."
Buffy seemed to catch the deeper meaning. How had Rupert ever worried over this girl's smarts? What Jenny wouldn't give for a class full of Willows and Buffys, even with a few Xanders and Cordelias thrown in for the amusement factor. "I get that," Buffy replied carefully. "I guess the most important thing is that no one should have to hurt alone. No matter how much or how little they have of it."
"I think that's a good rule." Jenny let her eyes drop to the first aid kit and began to fumble through it herself, coming up with a butterfly bandage and a little moist towelette of antiseptic. "Here, Buffy, let me see." She waited for Buffy to protest or to pull away, to insist that she had to focus on icing Jenny's aching neck, but it never came. Buffy simply turned her head and dropped her eyes a bit shyly as she kept the ice pack pressed against Jenny's bruises.
Jenny worked slowly and carefully as a comfortable silence seemed to settle around them. She noted how Buffy flinched a little at the antiseptic even as she tried very hard not to, but how she tilted her head a bit more toward Jenny, an invitation of sorts, when Jenny had to smooth her hair back to get a clear shot to apply the bandage. It made Jenny wonder about all of the times Buffy had gone home bloodied and aching and in pain and had no one to tend to her. She'd never really given much thought to Buffy's constant double-life, her hiding the core of who she was from nearly everyone, including her own mother, even as she'd carried a near-constant compassion for Buffy and her lack of any sort of a normal adolescence or eventual adulthood.
"There," Jenny said in a near-whisper when she'd managed to wrangle the bandage at least somewhat effectively over Buffy's cut. She smiled, a bit easier this time, when Buffy looked up at her with gratitude, and she let the hand that had been softly pressing and soothing Buffy's crown drift down a bit, softly stroking Buffy's cheek and cupping her chin before returning to her own lap. And she was very surprised to find Buffy smiling - a bit nervously, they could both admit, for it had been quite an unexpected evening in like every way imaginable - but actually smiling, and at Jenny no less, in such a way that Jenny felt like they were finally seeing each other for the first time.
It was then that Rupert and Willow finally rejoined them, the both of them looking completely exhausted but just a touch more relaxed than they'd been, well, since the morning of Buffy's surprise party over a month ago. Willow made no comment on what Jenny realized was probably a strange scene - she and Buffy, famously at odds, now tending to each other's wounds like old friends - but simply collapsed into one of the chairs around the table as Rupert tiredly paused just before her.
Buffy immediately moved into action, seemingly reading the signals as she eased the ice pack off Jenny's skin and replaced everything in the kit. She hopped down off the table but lingered in front of Jenny for a moment, their height difference made even more apparent from Jenny's still-seated position on the higher table. Jenny reached forward on pure instinct, just as Buffy had earlier that day when she'd approached her outside and offered a fragile truce, putting her palm against Buffy's face once more with one hand and stroking through her hair with the other. "Thank you," she said meaningfully, knowing that Buffy would interpret her words as applying to more than just the ice and the company. "I'm going to make this right. I will."
A day ago and Buffy might have nodded at her words and taken them as a promise she would hold Jenny to with no mercy. A few weeks ago and Buffy probably would have raged and reacted and possibly had her up against another desk with accusations about liars and empty promises. But the Buffy of today said none of those things.
"It's not your job to," Buffy said earnestly. "You didn't break it and it's not on you to fix it. I just...I think your only job should just be staying alive, okay? I think Giles would agree with me."
"And me," Willow broke in from somewhere behind her. "I second that."
"See," Buffy said to Jenny. "Everyone agrees, so it's settled. You're going to stay alive, we're all going to, to be really specific, and I'll personally annihilate anyone who tries to do otherwise."
"Good SAT word."
Jenny couldn't help but smile at Willow's sunny observation. "Well that sounds like a good deal to me," she said lightly. "But, sometime, you and I should talk. Like, really talk. I think it might help us clear the air for good to have it all out in the open."
"The air seems pretty crystal clear to me," Buffy observed. "But I hear you. And sometime when it's bright and sunny and school is actually safe...wow, did I actually just say that...we should talk." She reached out and touched Jenny's own cheek then. "We're going to conspire against you, Giles," she tossed out of her shoulder, giving Jenny a final small smile before moving back toward her Watcher. Jenny watched, touched, as Buffy hugged him a bit awkwardly before pulling back quickly and going to sit across from Willow.
And then Rupert met her gaze and everything else seemed to fall away.
Jenny wasn't even conscious of Rupert moving toward her and closing the distance between them. She only registered that suddenly he was before her and his arms were coming around her and she was clinging to him as if for dear life, burying her face into the crook of his neck and finally, finally feeling like she could breathe again.
"I've got you," Jenny heard Rupert murmuring quietly, distantly, almost as if he was very far away. "Jenny, please don't cry. You're safe now."
"She needs to cry, Giles," Willow offered softly, sounding much older and wiser than her years. "Sometimes you have to just let it all out." And Jenny realized then that the awful sort of choked, gasping noise that she was hearing was actually coming from her, and that she was sobbing - really sobbing, into Rupert's rather comfortable sweater, in full view of Buffy and Willow. But strangely, she registered, no one seemed to care.
Jenny pulled back a little in Rupert's arms so that she could see him fully, and Rupert's expression of comfort and care mixed with a great deal of trepidation and panic actually made her giggle despite the overwhelming nature of the whole thing. "Really, England?" Jenny raised an eyebrow but wound her arms around his neck to soften her teasing. "All of the monsters you've faced and crazy things you've seen, but a crying girl freaks you out?"
Rupert didn't hesitate. "Not usually," he admitted quietly. "I've got some practice afterall." Jenny's lips quirked as Buffy muttered an offended response somewhere behind her. "But when it's my, um, girlfriend after she's nearly murdered by a master vampire who enjoys torturing for fun, it changes things a bit." And Jenny felt the little bit of comic relief leave them in that moment as the righting of her final wrong sprouted before her. She tugged Rupert closer to her spot on the table until he was standing nearly on top of her, and Jenny wound her arms tightly around him, sighing as his arms came up and around her to anchor her close to his chest. They fit, Jenny thought, her eyes shut tightly against the emotions roaring through her. They'd always fit, somehow, even in the beginning when they had seemed like complete opposites. They just managed to go together somehow, the most unlikely of pieces connected into something beautiful. And the feeling of being in Rupert's arms again, of just...fitting, of being back together and whole again, made the pain of all of their time apart even more apparent. And even more terrifying was the reality that that was almost all that it ever would have been.
Jenny pulled back again, the desperation coursing through her as quickly as the thoughts raced in her head. "I love you," she said clearly, holding Rupert's eyes firmly with her own and not caring in the slightest that the two curious teenagers behind her were likely hanging on every word. "I meant it, this afternoon. I didn't expect to fall in love with you, but I did. I love you and I'm in love with you. And knowing that I hurt you, hurt you all, it just tore me up. I wish things had been different."
Rupert held her face gently in his hands and touched his forehead to hers. "If things were different, you could very well be dead," he pointed out, his voice breaking a little over his words. "And I...I don't think I'd want to be in a world that you weren't in. Because I'd spend whatever was left of my life trying to find you again, or wishing that I could have saved you. Or wishing that you had any way of knowing how much I love you too."
Jenny's eyes filled again and flowed down her cheeks in warm waves. "I would have known," she said, her voice taking on a wobbly tone. "Tonight, even when it looked like it was going to be the end, I knew that you loved me. And all I could do was hope that you'd know somehow that I meant what I said and that I truly, fully loved you, too." She let her eyes fall closed as Rupert gently tugged her forward and tucked her back into his arms, his hands smoothing her hair as he patted her head comfortingly.
"I'm so sorry," she breathed into his shoulder. "I'm just so sorry." The enormity of the night, of nearly fucking dying, coupled with the intense heaviness of the past few weeks - Angelus's return and Buffy's heartbreak and her numerous lies of omission and Rupert and the kids shutting her out and her uncle's death and the sickening, overwhelming feeling of sadness and regret and misery she'd woken up with every single damn day and shouldered on her own and the pressure she'd put herself under to make things right, knowing that they'd all probably still hate her anyway - bubbled up in her throat, choking her almost as effectively as Angelus nearly had.
"It's going to be all right now," Rupert murmured, still stroking her head, and Jenny was surprised to find that she actually felt some of the tightness inside her loosening at the simple platitudes. "We're okay, Jenny. You're safe and that's all that matters. That's all that should have ever mattered."
"So what now?"
"Now I keep you close," Rupert said simply. "I...I think we've wasted enough time and energy on things that cannot be changed, and being apart because of things that don't really matter. Now I just want to have you close to me, to have you safe. With us. With me. I don't ever want to be so far apart again that the worst could happen. Nothing is worth that."
Jenny felt Rupert's words unlock something inside of her, freeing her from the prison she'd kept herself within just as effectively as his crossbow has broken Angelus's grip on her neck. "That's what I want, too," she said, the tears threatening to spill once again. "I don't think I realized how much I missed you and the kids until it was nearly permanent. And now that I know and I'm still here...I don't ever want to be that far away from you ever again."
"You won't." Jenny could hear the unspoken truths beneath Rupert's firm reassurance. I love you. I forgive you. I need you. We all need you. You matter. Stay close to me. And there, in Rupert's arms, with their two unlikely proteges behind her, Jenny felt the final piece of her heart start to heal. They were going to be just fine.