Resentment – Willow
I hear voices arguing, but they seem very far away.
"I can't believe you, you know what he did!" That's Xander, he sounds angry.
"I know what she did too!" Cordelia hisses back.
Xander doesn't seem to have a reply to that. I want to say that I was distraught; I was grieving, that they can't hold me responsible, but I don't have the energy to speak and my throat hurts terribly.
"Angel's not the one lying unconscious in the hospital," Xander says.
"Willow's not lost somewhere under the city terrified that everyone she knows is suddenly going to turn on her," Cordelia replies angrily. "You know how Angel is, he won't understand that just because one person he trusted hurt him doesn't mean the rest of us will."
"Why should he need to understand? He attacked her. We are going to destroy him this time," Xander says. "I warned you that this would happen, but no one would listen to me. You know I did. I told you a hundred times he was going to kill one of us."
"Goddamn it Xander," Cordelia snaps, her voice rising. "This wasn't about Angel misunderstanding some innocent little mistake on Willow's part. Okay he overreacted, but she's not dead and she should have known better."
"Willow wasn't rational," Xander sighs. "Who would be under the circumstances?"
And then I remember what had happened. I remember when it was all over. I remember wanting to sit down in the middle of the street and just wailing.
I wanted to turn back the clock a few hours and do everything differently.
I wanted Buffy to be alive.
I wanted Tara to wake up.
I wanted to grieve.
I wanted to breakdown.
I didn't want responsibilities, not right then and certainly not for an insane, uncooperative vampire.
"Shut up!" I screamed at Angel. Even then I knew I shouldn't have. But I wanted to lash out at him, because he didn't have to hold it together. He could fall apart if he felt like it, and no one, not even Xander, would hold it against him, but me, I had to deal.
I couldn't even think, not with Angel making that horrible, endless keening noise. "Angel! Quiet!" I ordered, harshly. I could see fear beginning to mix with the grief in his expression but I just couldn't bring myself to care.
All along I'd done my best to back Buffy in every decision she's made about Angel. Not just since he came back all screwed up but all the way back to High School. Now Buffy was gone and I just didn't feel anything toward Angel except fury. It was his fault I wasn't with them, his fault I couldn't take the time to cry.
Spike brought Angel to Sunnydale to visit. The bleached moron could never leave well enough alone. Buffy was happier forgetting about Angel. She'd make plans to go down to LA, but it was never hard to find an excuse to for her not to go.
And no matter what anyone thinks, what Buffy thought, it wasn't her fault Angel ended up getting hurt. Just like it's not my fault that Oz died.
Cordelia, Wesley, the other two, they had no right to drag Buffy back into Angel's problems. Angel left Buffy, he called it quits, she owed him nothing.
If Angel got in over his head without her that was his problem, not Buffy's. Buffy had enough to deal with just considering her responsibilities to the people who hadn't abandoned her.
And afterwards? Why did Buffy have to be the one to cast the deciding vote on whether or not we killed Angel? I'll never understand why Giles didn't tell Wesley and Cordelia to just deal with him themselves and leave us alone.
Still, once things were decided our lives could have gone back to what passes for normal. Buffy could have not thought about Angel, except for Spike.
Spike just had to bring him to Sunnydale every couple of months and Buffy always felt too guilty to tell Spike to just turn around and leave. I would have, I did, Spike said it wasn't my choice to make.
So they, Spike and Angel, were here when it happened. One more attempt by the demon population to open the Hellmouth. Spike said he and Angel could help. Buffy said there was no way she was taking Angel into a fight. Giles and Xander insisted someone be left behind to watch Angel. Tara, Anya and Xander couldn't because Angel doesn't mind them. Buffy and Spike were our best fighters so they were going by default and Giles pulled rank on me.
They went off to save the world again and I got stuck babysitting. Why couldn't we have just tied him up and left him with Anya? She wasn't going anyway, being six months pregnant. I wonder what she'll do when Xander has to tell her you can't actually have 2.4 children.
About fifteen minutes after they left Angel started getting all upset. He took off and all I could do was follow him to the burnt out wreck of the old high school. The Hellmouth vibes had kept anyone from wanting to rebuild on the site, even though it's been almost twenty years since we blew the place up. The only reason anyone ever built there was that Mayor Wilkins insisted on putting a school there back when he was Richard Wilkins Jr. instead of the third.
By the time Angel and I arrived Tara was already deep into her spell, Buffy was fighting alone, bleeding from at least a dozen wounds while Xander tried to keep the various tentacles spewing from the Hellmouth away from Giles' unconscious form. I remember Xander telling me, between the battle ending and him leaving with the ambulance, that Spike had been dusted about ten minutes before Angel and I got there. In other words right when Angel had freaked out.
As soon as we arrived Angel threw himself into the thick of the battle, while I added my strength to Tara's helping her to force the Hellmouth closed again.
Angel and Buffy kept the tentacles away from Tara and I until we were done, then Buffy crumpled to the floor. I released the spell and went to help her only to realize that Tara was still helplessly pouring all her strength into the seal we had erected. I tried to help her free herself from the spell, but after Giles had been knocked out Tara had believed that she would have to finish the spell on her own so she tied it directly into her life force. I wasn't able to break the ties and could only watch helplessly as she was drained, leaving behind a shell that will never wake-up.
I don't know how long I sat there holding her hand, but it wasn't long enough, I never wanted to move from her side. Then Angel was shaking me into full awareness.
I turned to see Xander performing CPR on Buffy. "Go for help," he panted.
I ran to the closest phone and called 911. When they came they bundled Tara and Giles into the ambulance, but left Buffy for the police. They thought they could help Tara, but I already knew I'd lost her.
They wanted us to all go to the hospital with them but Angel wouldn't leave. He just started making that awful noise. Xander had to explain to them about Angel, about him being mentally deficit, not about him being a vampire.
In the end it was decided that Xander would go to the hospital with Giles, and he'd call Cordy and have her come get Angel. Meanwhile, I would stay at the school with a clueless EMT, a bunch of policemen who'll write us off as one more Sunnydale statistic; just one more "wild dog attack" or maybe it was those gangs on PCP again; Buffy's body, Spike's ashes are around somewhere too, and Angel. I was supposed to be getting Angel settled down, but I just couldn't seem to bring myself to deal with anything, let alone Angel's hysteria. Our remaining medic was fussing over Angel, just like everyone always fusses over Angel, trying to do what I was supposed to be doing. Only Angel didn't want anything to do with him and he didn't want the police anywhere near Buffy. So forced myself out my stupor because if someone didn't do something about Angel before the paramedic got the bright idea to try sedating him the police were going to have even more bodies to explain away.
I tried to get through to Angel but he just kept screaming and I couldn't stand it anymore so I slapped him and screamed, "Pay attention to me Angel!" I can't imagine why I did something so stupid. I'd just been worrying about the police or the medic doing something that would make Angel turn violent then I hit him.
He stopped screaming then. For a second he looked totally blank. Then he switched to his demon face. I remember Cordy having said that he never does that any more. Then everything was a blur and I felt him bite me and I screamed and everyone was yelling and Angel tossed me across the room like a rag doll and fled. After that everything went black.
"Xander?" I whisper in a tiny sounding voice. "What happened?"
"Angel bit you," Xander replied darkly. "What the Hell where you thinking Will? He could have killed you, didn't you think we'd lost enough people last night?"
"I'm sorry," I whisper.
"It's okay," Xander sighs. "Giles is going to be fine, but the doctors, they can't even figure out what's wrong with Tara, I'm so sorry Will."
I feel tears welling up in my eyes and spilling down my cheeks. "Tara," I moan.