Part XI

DAWN

Dear Buffy,


I should have lied to them.

When I walked down the stairs, still in shock from what I had just seen and heard, the others asked me what happened, and I told them everything. . .stupid of me. I could have made up a story about how I was cowering up there, and that you had figured it out and jumped after passing on your message. . .why did I have to tell them that I was ready to jump myself?

I want them to hate me, Buffy. . .because of me, they've lost their best friend. . .the love of their lives. . .the closest thing Giles had to a daughter. . .their hero. I could have lied, and they would have hated me, or perhaps pitied me. . .the poor little transformed ball of energy that thinks she's a person, and who just lost her sister. . .poor pathetic Dawn.

But I didn't lie, and now along with the sad, comforting looks and hugs I keep getting from them, I see them looking at me. . .thinking that maybe I have some of the answers. We both know that I don't. I didn't offer to die because I was being noble, Buffy. . .I offered because it had to be done, and I couldn't live with the thought of everything ending because of me. Why didn't you let me do it, damn you? You were the hero. . .I'm just the one who reminds them every day that someone played with all of your minds, and that the cost was their dearest blood, spilled on the ground of some sorry excuse of a construction site.

They're all putting on brave faces for me, Buffy. . .but I can see it in their eyes: they're all shut down inside, even worse than when Mom died. . .it's like knowing you were there kept a light shining inside of all of them. . .when you died, it killed part of them, too. . .and I'm terrified that nothing I can ever do will begin to make it even remotely better for them. . .I'm not you.

Dad still hasn't been heard from. . .at this point, it seems only fair that he shouldn't come back. . .his daughter is dead: I'm just a figment of someone's imagination that he inexplicably has had to pay child support for. Maybe I should want him to come back and take me away from here. . .but I'm not sure I can bring myself to leave this place. . .to stop walking by that construction site and staring at that place where everything changed forever for all of us.

You told me to live my life. . .fine. I'll live my life. . .I'm going to figure out some way that I can help the others. . .I don't care if it's witchcraft, or computers, or any other weird thing that I can learn that will let me fight evil with the others. . .and I'll walk right over any one of them who tries to stop me. I'll fight with every last bit of strength within me. . .then when the inevitable happens and I die, I'm going to track you down and kick your ass for leaving us like you did. . .don't laugh at me, I mean it.

I hate you. I love you. I miss you.


Your sister,


Dawn


. . .to be continued


As always, comments are welcomed and desired