Sins of the Past Chapter 23

Exes

They're all against me.

I pull against the straps around my wrists. They don't budge.

They've been in on this from the very beginning. Buffy did it to me with Faith, and then Faith did it to me with Connor. I don't really matter to them, and I never did. I'm just something to be played with or protected. I'm supposed to be kept away from anything and anyone that's even the least bit interesting or dangerous or worth talking to.

Again I pull on the straps but nothing happens to them.

Even when I try to break away from them and live my own life on my own terms, they find a way to keep me locked up. To keep me from being my own person by putting people in place to keep me safe. People who are there to protect me from the world whether I want them to or not. Of course, I don't get to know that they're protecting me. That would give me too much power over myself. If I knew who was around me and why they wouldn't be able to control me and make me think what they want me to think. I'd have to think for myself and do what I want. That would be too much for them to handle. They can't have that. If they did, I wouldn't be safe.

Taking a deep breath, I try to sit up as quickly as I can, pushing against the strap around my shoulders.

But I don't want to live in a safe world. I wanna live in the real world. Where I can make mistakes and do things I shouldn't because I can. I want to be able to mess up and get dirty and get screwed by the whole world... both literally and figuratively.

It doesn't take long for the strain to get too much and it forces me to lay back on the hospital bed.

I don't care what she said, I definitely think she slept with him to get him to follow me around. She probably thought that she could teach him a few things about what I like and don't like just in case I wanted to have a little fun with him. Which I guess is why it happened in the first place. I'm sure she coached him and gave him ideas of what to do and say just to get me interested.

I try and shift on the bed, hoping that one of the straps will come loose.

I wouldn't put it past her. She's always been manipulative. The whole beginning of our relationship was based on her manipulating me. She lied to me for weeks. Every time we got together. Every time she smiled at me, she was lying. She told me things I wanted to hear just to get me to like her. Our whole relationship was built on a lie. A lie that my sister wanted her to tell. And now she wants me to swallow the same type of lie that my sister tried to force on me.

The struggle gets too much and I lie back, still held down on the bed.

But I'm not going to let them do it to me again. I won't be held down by these idiots who think they know better what my life should or shouldn't be. I will get free, from here and from them, even if I have to force them to see it. I don't know if I can actually do it, but I have no idea how far this new ability might be.

I thrust my right leg up to try and get it free but the strap makes it backlash back to the bed.

It changed that sorry excuse for a victim was changed back to a human until I changed her back because of whatever I did to her. I'm still not exactly sure how it happened. Obviously, whatever it was had something to do with my blood mixing with hers, or touching her skin, or something. But why her and why now? Does it only work on vampires? Then why did that nurse's hair change color when I told her she'd look hotter as a redhead?

Just to see if it makes a difference, I thrust my left leg out to test whether that will do anything.

She didn't even seem to notice that the change had happened. She was completely oblivious to it. Yet when I did it to that Sarah girl, she remembered everything. Was that because I pushed her to remember everything or did I screw it up the first time? How does this thing even work? What are the rules? Are there any rules? Maybe I can just do whatever the hell I want with them. That could be a lot of fun.

I look around the room, taking it all in.

But I don't know what I would change. There are a lot of things about the world and about people that I would love to change. I'm not even sure where I would start. I turned a vampire human, and vice versa, maybe I could do more of that. I could do without a lot less vampires in my life. I could do without demons and vampires and all the creepy crawlies in the world. But I'm not even sure that I could do things like that. I had to open up an old wound in order to change her from human. It probably happened when she bit into my neck and nearly killed me. I'm guessing that the only reason I survived was because somewhere between her biting into me and me waking up in the hospital, she became human.

I wasn't even conscious when it happened. Why did I want her to become human? I didn't much like her as a human. All I really wanted was to get in her pants, and that desire pretty much ended the second she became a vampire and started torturing me. I'm not my sister, I don't get off on the whole vampire thing. I mean, sure, there was the thing I had for Spike for a bit and that guy I didn't know was a vampire when I hung out with him, but that's probably more about the bad boy thing then anything else. There's a reason I gave up my V card to the person I did.

My eyes can't help but fall on the door to my hospital room.

Speaking of which... maybe I should start with the obvious. These people are trying to control my life. They want to tell me who I can and can't be. What if I made them stop? What if I could make them see that what they were doing was wrong? Force them to understand that what they're doing is wrong in a way that they couldn't deny? Maybe I could make them believe it so that it would never even occur to them to try it again?

All it would probably take is a little bit of blood. I think...

Suddenly, the door opens and I see the one person I would rather hadn't come walk through it. She stops just inside when she sees me looking right back at her. There's the beginning of a smile but that quickly fades.

"Hey DK..."

Hey? That's what she says to me after everything? Hey? Seriously?

"Seriously? That's what you're going to go with? After everything, you're just gonna go with... 'Hey DK'?"

There's a long silence in the room before she answers.

"I wasn't sure there was anything else to say."

Of course not, why would she?

"Of course not. What else is there to say? It's not like we have anything to talk about."

"That was your... bay... Dawn, look, I know... this wasn't exactly how I pictured us seeing each other again either."

She pictured us seeing each other again?

"Well that's funny, because I was hoping never to see you again, ever."

A long silence follows my comment and I can't help but smile at the look of pain on her face when she looks away.

Maybe I don't have to change anything. It might make this less fun.

Eventually she brings her eyes back to mine.

"I didn't want this. I was hoping that we'd talk on the phone for a couple months or something and then see each other when you came home for the holidays."

"Yeah well, we don't always get what we want, do we F?"

Again she looks away and the word joy doesn't begin to describe what it gives me.

"Dawn, we... we didn't just come here because you're in the hospital. There's another reason."

Of course there is, because no one ever comes to see me just for the fun of it.

"Oh good, this will be fun."

"You remember the Faraquad demon?"

I let my head fall back against the bed to look up at the ceiling.

"Kinda hard to forget."

"We think we know who sent it. They... came looking for us."

Of course they did.

"So what? Did you kill it? Are you just here to tell me everything's fine? Because you could've done that with a phone call."

"No, we..."

I can almost see the disappointment on her face in my head.

"We tried... but it was too strong."

And I thought the spy she sent in was a terrible attempt at a hero.

"So you didn't bring in the slayerettes?"

Again I can hear the pain in the silence after my question and I have to smile at the feeling it gives me.

"We did, but..."

"Let me guess... he was too strong."

The silence from her tells me everything I need to know.

"So, you're here to tell me that I'm about to die?"

"No, bay..."

She keeps catching herself when she wants to say baby.

"Dawn, you're not going to die."

I don't remember her being this stupid.

"We're here to save you."

They're still doing it. They're still trying to control my life.

I bring my eyes back to her.

"And what if I don't want you to?"

That has her with a confused look on her face.

"DK... I..."

"You just ASSUME that I actually WANT to be saved."

"I... I don't get it."

"It's not that hard to understand. Just go home."

There's a long silence from her when I say that.

"DK, I know you're angry with me, but..."

"What makes you think this is about you?"

More silence from her.

"Go home."

"Dawn..."

"I said GO HOME!"

I push myself up off the bed as hard as I can when I yell, hitting the straps really hard and being forced back. For a while, there's a look of guilt on her face before she turns and heads for the door.

Finally!

"Go! Get out of here."

She makes it to the door and stops to face me.

"I'm not leaving for good, but I am leaving you alone. Let me know when you're ready to talk."

She's gonna be waiting a long time.

"You'll be waiting a long TIME!"

It isn't long before she finally leaves.

Took her long enough.

End of Chapter 23