A/N: Welcome to Part 3, Season 4. I'm off from work this week so my fic game is on point. Maybe Season 5 coming this week?
Jenny had to quit with this baseless optimism. She could take or leave smoking, drinking, sugar, caffeine, even swearing, and God, even sex, but her addiction to baseless, groundless optimism was slowly becoming her undoing. Survive a near-murder? Of course things could only get better! Avert another apocalypse but send a teenage Slayer running for the hills (or, well, Los Angeles) only to return withdrawn and shellshocked? Just give it some time! Survive another literal hellscape of a school year AND graduation, which had been a particular feat this year, only to find yourself jobless and unfulfilled while stepping in as the Cool Adult to a gaggle of now-baby adults - college students - and Vampire Babysitter to one very obnoxious and yet mildly amusing Spike, and Provider of Free Food, Free Therapy, and Free Entertainment to all of the above? No problem. Surely this had to be the basement in the metaphor that was life, right? What was left but bedrock? The only way to go was up.
Except that now they were all speechless. Quite fucking literally speechless.
And so, Jenny resolved, this was the end of her brainless positivity, her easy optimism. In all honesty, it wasn't even her brand. Jenny was all witchcraft and dangly earrings and black coffee and leather jackets and loud music and dark nail polish. The positivity vibe fit much better with Rupert, who while British and stuffy also enjoyed classical music and tea and breakfast in the "garden" (courtyard, at best), and kept reasonable hours while Jenny was apt to pull all nighters lost in the rabbit hole that was witchcraft message boards and groan unenthusiastically when the sun dared peak through her blackout curtains. Which Rupert threw open, without fail, every single fucking morning at the crack of dawn on his way to the "garden" for a "spot of tea." Jenny sometimes would manage a cup, but really a gallon, of coffee, in the fucking courtyard, which was a slightly more appropriate name for the dumpy square of patio outside their door.
But at least Rupert had the presence of mind to make her coffee, Jenny reminded herself. He also had enough sense not to argue with her futile optimism the few times she'd voiced it; she did tend to veer toward realism most of the time, but Rupert for all of his sunniness could never be classified as any sort of a "glass half full" sort of a man. If anything, Rupert probably saw said glass as just another dirty glass that someone else had already gotten their germs all over and gave no thought to the level of liquid inside, half empty or half full. Unemployment had not been good for them.
But they'd weathered it, the small optimistic part of Jenny still managed to eek out, strangled as though the voice might be. They were still together and still in love, very much in love, thank you, and still had sex a surprisingly high number of times each week. Which might have had something to do with them both being unemployed and maybe even more about how suddenly, suddenly the kids - all of them - seemed to be having sex like rabbits and they, the original grown-ups of the group, now had to keep pace. It was fun, Jenny thought with some satisfaction. But also tiring. And Jenny sometimes found herself both amazed both at their stamina and the fortitude of her birth control, but also weirdly a little disappointed in the latter. If someone had told her a year ago that she'd actually be questioning why she wasn't pregnant, instead of just thanking whoever it was who was smiling down upon her, she wouldn't have believed it. But in reality, she never believed any of the shit that had been ahead of them. Maybe she wouldn't even now.
Her own mid-thirties life crisis aside - the lack of a job and steady income, the sudden awareness that their apartment was not so fun nor nice if two people, now three counting the hostage, were spending all damn day there week in and week out, her intense love for Rupert coupled with a tiny piece of frustration about where they were heading and what they were doing, and the even tinier but even more confusing part of her that was starting to consider her uterus with a longing to actually put something in it - there were also the issues of the kids and the wider world. The kids seemed to be...fine, depending on the day and depending on the kid. Although Jenny privately wondered some days how none of them, her included, had ended up pregnant given the absolutely wild libidos in their circle. And the world was, well, the world, or their world, rather, which was crazy and dangerous and now even stranger than the year before. And that was before they'd all woken up mute.
Jenny had never realized just how much she'd taken her voice for granted until she didn't have it. And she wouldn't soon forget the look on Rupert's face when he realized that neither of them could speak. She imagined that hers looked about the same. He'd been up and nearly dressed as Jenny still lay stretched in their bed, not too eager to face another day babysitting Spike. She was relishing Xander and Anya's babysitting arrangement. It had been far too long since Jenny and Rupert had had the apartment to themselves. Spike couldn't move, of course, and the loft was good enough for visual privacy, but having to listen to a vampire gloat the next morning about what exactly he'd overheard the night before, in vivid, excruciating detail and always in front of whatever kid showed up in their kitchen, was straight up not a good time. Rupert had turned to her mid-sentence and blanched, and Jenny had grabbed at her throat, panicked, as she'd tried to force words out with no success. Rupert had dashed to her then, nearly crushing her in his effort to pull her to him, to smooth her hair and examine her face to reassure himself, Jenny assumed, that beyond the sudden speech loss, they weren't actually dead. And apparently they weren't.
And so they'd had little choice but to wait around. Jenny was desperate for any sign of the kids, but had no way to track them down sans words. And she realized, with increasing fear, the chaos that would be unleashed in this town if people couldn't scream for help. Hell, she could slip in the shower and Rupert would be none the wiser. It was after that particular thought crossed her mind that Jenny had taken Rupert's hand and forcefully pulled him to the living room. They'd wait together doing decidedly non-dangerous tasks. Gathering books for research. Forcing down their usual tea and coffee. Longing for alcohol, but that might have just been on Jenny's end.
Xander and Anya showed up first, Spike in tow. They all stood nodding awkwardly at each other until Jenny finally had enough. She hugged Xander forcefully, then Anya, realizing for the first time just how little the blonde ex-vengeance demon actually was. They both had looked surprised, but not entirely creeped out. Or ungrateful, as it seemed, because Xander patted her shoulder gently and Anya had smiled at her more fully than Jenny had ever seen from her before, unless of course it was directed at Xander and having to do with sex. Spike was not given a hug, but Jenny managed eye contact and a wave, both extravagant considering that Jenny hadn't been able to look at Spike directly since his very accurate depiction of her climax a few weeks back. And for once he looked appreciative rather than mocking.
The girls showed up next, clustered close to each other and wearing matching dry erase boards around their necks. Brilliant. Jenny was sure she had one of her own buried somewhere in her stuff. She'd watched as Giles tenderly greeted them both and something unnamed rose up in her that Jenny hadn't been expecting but knew was tied somewhere in connection to her increasingly needy uterus. And then they'd turned to her.
Jenny hugged Buffy first, trying to put everything she could into her embrace because with Buffy, they tended to be based more in words rather than affection. They'd had their share of tender moments, but they stood out to Jenny brightly exactly because they'd been so rare. But Buffy squeezed her back in a way that seemed very young, which was a vibe that Buffy hadn't given off in quite some time now, so Jenny did her best to simply hold her for a second. When they pulled away, Buffy mouthed a voiceless "Hi" and used the marker on her board to draw a little smiley face. Jenny wordlessly took the marker gently from Buffy's hands and drew a small heart beside it. She wasn't sure exactly what message she was trying to get at in words - I'm glad you're okay, We're going to stick together, I know that this is scary, We'll figure this out, I love you all vied for top choices - but Buffy smiled at her enough that Jenny could see that she understood all the same.
Buffy stepped around her to look at the books they'd gathered on their table and Jenny turned her attention to Willow. Willow eagerly erased her "Hi Giles!" to quickly replace it with a "Hi Ms. Calendar" and flashed it at Jenny with a broad smile. Ah. Here was an opening.
Much like she had with Buffy, Jenny eased the marker from Willow, but instead of writing a new message, she made sure to catch Willow's eye directly so that she would watch what Jenny wrote. She used her finger to smudge out the "Ms. Calendar" and wrote Jenny boldly in its place. It was time.
She'd been surprised that it had stuck as long as it did. Jenny had been convinced that as soon as they'd all shed high school (much like the skin of the giant snake they'd triumphantly slain), one of them - probably Xander - would jump on the "Jenny" train and that would be that. They were adults now and no longer her students. But surprisingly none of them didn't.
"Do you think they're waiting for me to make the first move," Jenny had wondered aloud to Rupert one night as they'd dressed for bed. "It seems weird now; so much time has passed. What I am just supposed to do, say 'hey kids, we've killed all sorts of demons together and survived death many times over, but now that you're all grown ups you can call me by my given name. Or preferred name, since it's actually my fake name? Am I overthinking this here?"
Rupert had tugged the tank top that she had literally just pulled down over her flat stomach back over her head. "I don't think it matters," he said. "What they call you. It doesn't change how they feel about you." And Jenny might have unpacked that further if he clearly hadn't been so interested in her now-bare breasts instead of her likely silly insecurities over something as trivial as a name. He was right, Jenny thought as he pulled them toward their bed and she straddled him gently, his hands already roving and stroking and caressing. What did it really matter?
But now, Jenny found that it did. Desperately so. They were all mute and somewhat helpless and Jenny wasn't honestly sure if she'd ever get to hear any of them say her name - or any part of it - in their distinct voices ever again. But if she was so lucky, they sure as hell were going to call her Jenny. They had earned that right to say it. And she really, really wanted to hear it.
She met Willow's eyes a bit defiantly, the memories and feelings and fears all associated with this simple correction swirling in her head. Willow only glanced at the board before hugging her fiercely. Jenny bit back what would have been silent tears anyway as Willow clung to her tightly and thought of all the things she wished she could say. She settled instead for a kiss of Willow's cheek and a hand gently holding Willow's head against her.
After a few moments, Willow pulled back, and Jenny assumed she'd join Buffy at the table for their pantomimed battle planning. But before she did, Willow caught Jenny's eye and her hands, holding them both tightly, and mouthed "Jenny" as clearly and articulately as one could muster when rendered mute. And Jenny hoped desperately that whatever this was, they'd fix it so that she'd get to hear that sweet, simple, but highly meaningful word in all of their own voices.
The rest was history, or what had become their history if only someone among them was recording it all for posterity. Rupert had given a lecture in total silence that Jenny wished she could have recorded, because had she had been able to make any sound at all, she would have been beside herself in hysterics. Buffy hunted and patrolled and ultimately was victorious. Spike, actually, was a rather pleasant companion when mute and while Xander and Anya continued to screw at a rate that even Jenny was starting to find unbelievable, it was all so much more enjoyable when there were no sounds to be overheard. Of course, this did become a bit problematic in other ways; Anya had managed to walk in on Jenny and Giles mostly undressed and completely occupied but in their own loft, apparently scoping out more private spots for her and Xander to do the deed. And Willow, once she could speak again, was very happy to tell Jenny all about her new friend Tara and the magic they'd done together after her Wicca group had turned out to be a dud.
And the dry erase boards had been regaled to faraway corners, never to be touched again if Jenny could help it. She preferred her messages in digital format anyway. But one evening not too long after, Rupert was off training with Buffy, which was miraculous considering her near surgical attachment to Riley, who seemed so much like a Ken doll Jenny had trouble actually thinking of him as a real person, and Willow arrived hesitantly at her doorstep. Which was unusual in that it was a weeknight and Willow was pretty serious with both her studying and then her magicking these days and also because she was clearly ill at ease, which she never, ever was around Jenny, and because she was carrying one of the abandoned white boards and a marker in her hands.
Jenny was immediately alarmed but smart enough to try to cover it. "Are the Gentlemen coming," she asked lightly, stepping aside to let Willow in the door. "Or are you saving your voice for something big?" She caught sight of Willow's face, all uncertain eyes and serious mouth, and felt ashamed. "I'm sorry, honey. I shouldn't joke." And then Jenny just really could have buried her head in her hands. "Ugh. That sounded more 'mom' than what I was going for. Sorry."
Willow shrugged, some of the tension broken a little. "It's fine," she offered. She paused to let Jenny by her so that Willow could follow her to the sofa. "Is that, uh, something you're trying out?"
Jenny was confused. "Trying out what?"
"Mom." Willow glanced at her midsection and Jenny got the hint. She reflexively touched her tummy, quelling a little under Willow's scrutiny, and realized immediately that this was the exact wrong thing to do if you were trying to prove the opposite point. She opened her mouth to fix it before it got worse.
"I'm not pregnant," she explained. "Not now, anyway. Or, well, planning to be soon. Sort of just...I don't know. I'm babbling. And you clearly are here with something to say. Or not so say." Jenny waited desperately for Willow to change the subject. She hadn't planned on unveiling her needy uterus to anyone except Rupert and not any time soon.
Willow looked intrigued but also deeply apprehensive. "I want to, uh, use the board to talk to you about something."
"O-kay. I can work with that. Should I confirm first, however, that YOU are not the one who's pregnant?"
"No-o-o," Willow drew the word out in a way that made Jenny sit up straighter. "Not exactly. I…I'm going to write now." So Jenny waited with baited breath as Willow scribbled.
So you know how I was with Oz? Willow flashed the board and Jenny nodded.
I thought. Willow erased. We were good together. I liked it, you know? Jenny nodded again.
But I don't think now that I really liked it. Or enough as I should have.
Jenny wasn't sure where this was going. She tugged the marker from Willow and shifted closer, crossing her legs on the sofa and waiting until Willow copied her position. Everyone's different, Jenny offered. She needed more to go on.
Yes. Willow underlined. That's just it. I'm different.
Different how? Jenny barely had the words on the board before she realized that Willow was stiff beside her, her breathing shallow. She looked, alarmed, and opened her mouth to speak before Willow shook her head adamantly. What is it?
Willow took what seemed to be a fortifying breath before taking the board and angling it away from Jenny to write. She turned it back once she was done, searching Jenny's face with obvious anxiety. I'm in love with someone else. And it feels completely different. But that's how I know that it's right.
Jenny paged through all of the people that they both knew, wondering who would cause Willow to look at her with such fear. Xander? No, they'd all suffered the fallout of that lapse in judgment. Riley? So not Willow's type. Spike? Homicidal, quite the turn off. Rupert? Ha. So who…
Who is it?
Again with the look and the private writing. The look in Willow's eyes was even more vulnerable as she watched Jenny nervously, still holding the board close to her chest. Jenny reached for it gently, feeling cheered when Willow let her take it.
Tara.
Oh. OH. Jenny's eyes flew to Willow's, but her fingers flew faster than her mind could comprehend. The two combined eventually though, because it was only a few crucial seconds before Jenny was holding the dry erase board in front of her forcefully so that Willow could see it clearly.
Willow, I love you. And she made sure to underline both "I" and "love" and "you" a few times for good measure. Jenny watched Willow's face as she read the message and journeyed from apprehension to relief to appreciation to joy before cycling back to the beginning. And suddenly Willow was across the couch and in her arms.
"Can I talk now," Jenny whispered. She rocked Willow gently against her as she heard the telltale signs of relief and residual fear make themselves known. The last time they'd talked with those damned boards, Jenny realized, she hadn't even been able to hear the kids laugh. Or cry. Or anything in between. This was better, so much better, especially when Willow nodded against her shoulder.
"I love you," she told Willow firmly. "Do you hear me? I love you."
"I love you, too," Willow answered easily. "But do you love me...because you love me. Or do you love me despite me...being gay?" Her tone was still guarded.
"I love you because you're you. I love you because you're Willow. I love you and will love you no matter who you love. Because whoever and however you love is always, always good with me. Always." It felt so good to speak such words. Jenny wondered how she ever had taken it for granted, had ever buried her words so deeply down that they'd been locked inside her clunking around painfully.
But Willow was still crying. "Tell me why you cry," Jenny asked softly.
"I don't know," Willow all but wailed. "I'm so relieved but it's still so scary, you know. I love Tara so much. And I thought I loved Oz, too, but maybe I was never as in love with him as I thought. I didn't know that love could be like this. Like it could feel like this. I always thought that what I'd had was good and nice and just what everyone else had. But...I didn't realize that it could be like this."
"But that's good," Jenny said comfortingly. "That's good that you can love like that. That you found love like that. And that you were able to realize that no matter how much you loved Oz, it wasn't everything. Loving the right person, it's like…"
"Like seeing all of the colors in the world instead of just like six," Willow cut in, and Jenny barely had time to admire the simile before she was barreling onward. "And I'm happy, I am. But I'm scared, too. About telling people. How they'll all react. About dealing with people who will hate me and not even know me. And about everything else that will be harder now."
"You're not wrong," Jenny agreed. "It's not an easy life, but it's not a choice. Well, I suppose you could choose to hide it, if you wanted to, but I tend to think that your life would be even harder. The people who love you are not going to abandon you. They might need to adjust and work harder to understand, because even really good people often don't understand what they don't know. And people may hate you, and that's going to suck, but those aren't going to be people that deserve any place in your life anyway."
Willow looked grateful and a bit relieved, so Jenny shifted them a bit on the couch so that Willow was still tucked into Jenny's side, but the ever-useful board was balanced between them on both of their thighs. Jenny began to draw absently as Willow watched carefully. Willow heart Tara. Tara heart Willow.
"That's why I was weird about the mom thing," Willow commented suddenly. "I can't shut my brain off. And I keep thinking about how even though this is all so amazing, there are still things that will be so hard. Like being a mom. Even though I'm getting way ahead of myself."
"It might not be," Jenny pointed out. "Extra steps, absolutely. More work to make it happen, without a doubt. But worth it, probably just the same as if you could do it without the extra effort."
"That's probably true." Willow took the marker from Jenny to add her own scribbles. Jenny + Giles. Giles heart Jenny. Jenny + Giles + She looked up at Jenny a bit shyly. "So...do you want to have a baby?"
Jenny had to hand it to her. "What, so we get through your hard stuff so now it's my turn," she teased, running her fingers through Willow's hair.
"You can take over the board if you want." Willow pushed the board more fully onto Jenny's lap. "It was actually helpful, but better this time that we could supplement with, you know, our actual voices."
"That's okay." Jenny let her mind wander for a moment. "And, to answer your question, I'm not sure. I've been thinking about it way more than I ever used to, though, which has to mean something. And I keep doing this weird thing where I'm like personifying my uterus. Like I feel like it's sad because it's empty."
"That is sort of weird," Willow agreed good naturedly. "But in a sweet kind of way. Your uterus seems lonely. You and Giles could do something about that. That part would probably be really fun even if the rest is sort of scary and stressful."
"I hear the end result is pretty spectacular," Jenny murmured, reveling in the surreal turn of the conversation and also that she was actually putting words to it, these quiet desires deep beneath her skin. "But it's not the right time yet. I don't know when the right time is, necessarily, just that I don't think we're there yet or I'm there yet, no matter how much noise my personified uterus is making." She didn't even want to get into the whole "babysitting Spike in a one bedroom loft" piece that surfaced every time she debated the issue herself, landing just under the annoyingly traditional but still valid argument that she and Rupert were, on paper, nothing official. She wasn't even on the lease for God's sake.
Willow tucked her chin onto Jenny's shoulder. "I think you'd be a good mom. And when it is the right time, don't forget to tell me." Her words seemed to catch up with her a bit and Willow hastened to expand on her previous statement. "I mean, like, not...not before. That might be weird. Kind of between you and Giles. I don't need to know the planning stages. But when it's official. When you are pregnant, I mean."
"Deal," Jenny smiled. Again with the thoughts about the hopeful future even amidst the chaos of the present and the trauma of the past. "Although you'd probably figure it out eventually. It tends to get pretty noticeable."
"Yeah. Round tummy, kind of hard to miss."
Jenny felt unexpectedly warmed by the sudden visual. She thought of the Jenny of two years ago, distant and brisk, not unfeeling or unkind but just oh so removed, flirting and teasing to avoid any actual intimacy with her boyfriend, settling for easy quips and glib conversations to avoid any real connections with her students. And the little optimistic part of her that she was trying so desperately to quell sprung forth again, this time with a hopeful photo reel: she and Rupert, settled a bit more permanently and mercifully free of Spike, the kids happy and well-adjusted and frequently underfoot, her tummy, as Willow had so succinctly put it, soft and round, Rupert with a swaddled infant in his arms.
"I love you," she told Willow again, grateful that she was alive and brave and just able, at all, to speak it aloud. Apart from the terrifying obvious, Jenny was surprised to find that their sudden, unexpected loss of words actually had its upsides. And Jenny wondered for the first time if perhaps the silence had unlocked something deep inside her, deep inside them all, if Willow's revelation was any indication, that allowed for the saying of what needed to be said.
"I love you, too," Willow answered. "I think we can retire the board for good now."