A/N : This is my last B/X piece, ever. I will always remain a shipper at heart, despite it never getting its dues on the television show, I am happy to say that at least it kept me wishing and hoping for seven years. I don't think I can ever stop becoming a B/Xer. I may have lost hope for this ship at one point in time, but I think I can never really turn my back on it. However, with the end of the series, I feel that it is also time for me to close this particular chapter in my life, and therefore, this is my farewell piece, of sorts, so to say. I'll still be in the B/X community, though my role will move from author, to reader. I would like to say 'thank you' to everyone who has ever supported my work, from starting to end, you are a great bunch of people, and I am happy to say that you have taught me a lot, and your enthusiasm is really just inspiring. I'll see you around.
***
It was funny, how you can spend your whole waiting for something, that when it finally comes you have no idea what to do with yourself. The apocalypse had been diverted, the First was defeated, or at least, beaten into submission for another millennia or so. It was not important. He didn't care.
The life he had built for himself
in Sunnydale had fallen to pieces, like the buildings that crumbled along with
the last shockwaves that rippled throughout the town he grew up in. What didn't
survive lay buried under a mess of dust and debris, and what did survive probably
wouldn't stay that way much longer.
What will you do now, Willow had asked Buffy, right as they laid their
eyes on their town of ruins. He had never seen a smile on Buffy's face quite
like the one that followed, and it was unnerving and beautiful at the same time.
She was a tired warrior who had finally
come home, from whichever savage land kept her in turmoil the last seven years.
She was free, and he knew that, like him, she could not understand it because
it was never in her grasp before.
Things got better as the weeks rolled on. They had kept a small calendar pinned
up on the kitchen wall, but for some reason, they never tore off the pages when
the months went by. It was as if there was some sort of desire to defy time
itself, to wish that the world would stand still as they struggled to put the
pieces of their broken lives back together. There was little comfort in victory.
It took some time, but inevitably, some sense of normalcy returned. The town
was rebuilt. Better than ever! , the new mayor announced, and a hollow
cheer echoed throughout the procession. It was good to see people on the streets
once more, and it felt better to take long walks on a dark night without the
apprehension of a quick and bloody supernatural end.
For the first few weeks, Buffy still walked around the graveyards around midnight, a stake clutched in her hand - expecting something, yet at the same time, knowing that it was never going to come. Her patrolling became increasingly random, and then at one point, she stopped altogether.
They knew she had accepted it when she threw out all her stakes, and buried Mr. Pointy in the backyard, in a poignant, if not somewhat amusingly eccentric display of humanity.
What do you do with a normal life?
*
"You're packing," Buffy says, leaning against the door frame. "Where ya going?"
Xander is kneeling in front of his bed, where some of his clothes is lying in neat, folded stacks. He picks up a light blue shirt with a bizarre Hawaiian print, and he laughs to himself as he puts it the bag he has next to him. He talks to her as he does this. "Somewhere. I thought maybe it's time for a second road trip."
She walks up to him and sits down on the bed, one hand hanging down between her knees, the other stroking the soft, cotton comforter that lay spread across his bed. "This is sudden."
"Not really. Been thinking about it for some time," he lifts up a bright green shirt for her to see, and tilts his head sideways as if it will help him get a better judgment. "What do you think? Too festive?"
"I don't think anything can be too festive for you," she ventures, and he laughs before nodding. He folds it casually and throws it into the bag with the rest of his things. Buffy pauses, taking a breath before speaking. "Can I come?"
His head shoots up and he looked at her direction, considering the loaded question as he plays with the band of his eye strap absent mindedly. "Are you serious?"
"Why not?" Buffy hops of his bed and sits beside him. She opens his bag wider and pokes through the things inside as if it were her own. "I think I could fit in here just nice."
"What about Dawn?"
"I don't think this can fit more than one person," she giggles, before turning her attention to some of the more interesting pieces of Xander's wardrobe lying on the bed. "Hmm, you know, with that eye-patch, you finally have a good excuse for buying weird clothes. You can say, yes, I really was half-blind when I bought 'em."
"Funny," he snatches the shirt she is playing with away from her, his fingers grazing hers ever so slightly, and he wonders if he has ever noticed how soft her skin is. "I'm sure we'll have a blast. But, again, what about Dawn?"
"I think Willow and Kennedy can look after her for a while," she says. "I've been waiting for a vacation for seven years."
"If they're okay with it, so am I," He zips the bag close. "And, besides, if my car breaks down again, you'll make it easier to get a lift."
"Well, I always knew I would be good for something," she says, jumping up and brushing her hands on her jeans. She walks towards the door, with a certain happiness he was almost certain was not there ten minutes ago. "I'll go pack my things."
He sits cross-legged on the floor, and looks at her as she leaves. "Okay," he says.
*
They are on the road. He cannot remember the last time when it was just the two of them, together, laughing. She worries about his driving, arguing that he wasn't that good a driver when he had two good eyes. He tells her that there is nothing to worry, he just has to drive a little slower. She only lets the issue drop when he agrees that they would take shifts driving.
When he drives, he gives her the occasional sideways glance, to take in how she is feeling. Most of the time, he finds her face pressed up against the window, like a child discovering everything for the first time.
"Do you know where we are going?" she asks, turning the radio volume down, so she can hear his response.
"No, that's the fun thing about road trips. The unpredictability," he swats her hand away from the knob of the radio, and turns it up to the normal volume, "And stop doing that. I can hear you just fine with the music on."
"Really? Because sometimes you act like you don't."
"What?" He feigns deafness. He does it on purpose, because he finds it incredibly amusing, especially when she glares at him indignantly. A part of him also knows that she enjoys these little exchanges, these little fake fights, so he encourages it.
"That's not funny," she says, turning the volume down again. "You missed the turning the last time because you couldn't here me tell you to turn."
"No big loss," It is his turn to turn up the volume back up. "I don't see why you were so keen on that orchard visit anyways."
"Because," she reaches out and grabs a hold of his hand as it is still on the radio knob. With a soft, gentle motion, she leads his hand to turn the knob in the opposite direction. "It's no fun if we're in the car all the time. I just wanted something to do."
He admits defeat on the radio stance. He withdraws his hand, and returns it to the steering wheel. "It's an orchard. It's just fruit. I could take you to a grocery store if you want to see fruit."
"It's different if they're still on the trees," she mumbles, folding her arms. "And besides, it would have been a great photo opportunity. We've only used half a roll so far, and I was expecting more pictures."
Without any indication, Xander pulls over to the side of the road, and stops the car. He opens the door, and steps outside.
She looks confused, and follows him. "What are you doing? Why did we stop?"
He gives her a lopsided grin, something that suddenly reminds her of the sixteen year old boy who crashed into a railing on a skateboard when he first saw her. "Bring the camera."
"What? Here?" She looks around. The only thing she sees is the road they were on, which stretched off into what looked like a never ending distance. They are nowhere. She feels the crunch of sand and stone beneath her sneakers, as she picks up the camera from the glove compartment.
He takes it from her, and plays with some of the buttons on the camera. She could never understand what most of them did, but he handled them like a natural. He holds it in his hand, squints, and then looks off into the distance. He places it on the roof of the car and then motions for her to stand on the large rock not too far from the car. She complies, not before giving him a look that seemed to be both confused and amused.
He looks at her through the camera lens, before raising the camera to the height it would be if it were on the roof of the car. Satisfied that it provided a satisfactory angle, he places it on the car before pressing one of the buttons on the top of the camera. He checks the digital display for confirmation, before running to take his place beside her.
"You're weird, you know," she starts to say, as he clambers up the rock to stand beside her.
"Shh, look at the camera," He throws one arm around her and pulls her close. In response, she wraps her right arm around his waist, and giggles as an errant wind blows strands of her hair across her face.
There is a flash, and they both hear a familiar whirring. He jumps off the rock and goes off to retrieve the camera from the roof of the car, Buffy following close behind.
"And what was that about?" she asks, taking the camera back from him, and looking at is as if she was not sure if he really did what he just did.
"You said you wanted more pictures," His response is so simple, that she couldn't help but feel a little bit irritated. He opens the door and climbs into the driver seat, motioning for her to come back into the car. She does.
"We're in the middle of nowhere," she says, slamming the car door close. He starts the engine.
"It's no orchard, I know," he responds cheekily, as he turns back onto the road, "But when I look at pictures, it's not really the place I care about."
She doesn't respond, and merely puts the camera back into the glove compartment. She thinks maybe that road-side picture is the best one so yet.
*
He switches on the lights and she shuffles into the room, her bag slung over her shoulder. She throws herself on the bed, and grabs one of the pillows tightly.
Xander looks around. It is not a very large room, but it would do. Two pictures are hanging on one of the walls, and on closer inspection he concludes they are either of flowers or of an animal of some sort. They are hideous and he doesn't care for them. They hang crookedly and any attempt to straighten them fail miserably, so he gives up.
He sits on the edge of the bed, while Buffy continues hugging her pillow. He finds a remote control by the bedside table, and uses it to turn on the television. The reception is bad, to put things likely, and he feels he is watching the program through a snowstorm. He turns it off in frustration and puts his bag down.
"You would think that for what we paid there would at least be a working television," he complains.
"I'm just thankful we have a room," she says, "If I have to drive for another minute I think I'll collapse."
Xander looks at his watch, and it tells him it is 11.49. It was Buffy's turn to drive, and after a many hours of looking, they had finally found a motel with vacancies. They walked in, tired and looking forward to a good night's sleep, only to be told there was only one room left.
Desperate, they took it, but it also meant there was one bed for the two of them.
He is surprised by how casually they accepted it. He thinks that if the same thing were to have happened five years ago, he would be sweating with excitement at the thought of spending the night with Buffy. Now, they both take to the idea of sharing the bed as if it were something completely normal, and there was no innuendo or awkwardness behind any of it.
"You want the bathroom first?" She says.
"Nah, it's okay," he leans back and rests against the headboard. "You go first. I'll chill out here for a while. Just don't use up all the hot water."
"I'll try, but no promises,"
she says as she gets up and walks towards the bathroom. Xander switches on the
television again as he hears the bathroom door slam. He flips the channels to
see if there is something that wouldn't completely destroy what was left of
his eyesight.
*
He turns off the shower and wraps a towel around his waist. The mirror in the bathroom has become all steamed up, and he wipes it away with his hand. He gives the face in the mirror a passing look, before running his hands through his hair. Sometimes he does not recognize his reflection, thinking it to belong to some strange man with only one eye. He touches the edge of his eye patch cautiously, as if the sensation would give him some sort of memory of what it was like to have two eyes.
Self-pity is never good, so he stops and pulls on an old, gray T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. He hangs the towel over the hook behind the door, and steps into the room, turning off the bathroom lights behind him.
He finds Buffy already in bed, curled up under the covers. Her back is to him, and he cannot tell if she is sleeping, but he takes no risks and tiptoes cautiously over to his side of the bed. As he climbs in, her eyes flutter open slowly, and she gives him a gentle smile.
"I didn't wake you, did I?" he asks, worried that her answer would be yes and that she would make him feel guilty for the rest of the night.
"No," she mumbles, and the tone of her voice tells him that if she were telling the truth, her answer would be totally different. "Wasn't really sleeping."
He apologizes anyway, and climbs under the covers. He lies on his back and stares at the ceiling, counting the tiles and thinking about how he would have constructed this building if he still had his old job. His thoughts are interrupted when she pulls herself closer to him, throwing both her arms around him.
"It's cold," she mutters as an explanation, and he is not sure if she is even saying it consciously. He feels her cheek pressed against his chest, and he cautiously puts one arm around her body.
*
They spend the rest of the week like they did the first few days, on the road with Buffy wanting to stop at every tourist attraction available. One time she manages to persuade him to pull over at a Barbie museum.
"Never thought you to be the
Barbie kind of girl," he says, in a pathetic attempt to dissuade her from
the idea.
"I guess that's two of us although I did have a few when I was a
kid," she answers, "I just want to have a look, and then we can get
out of there before we damage your macho reputation."
He agrees, begrudgingly, but the whole time he can't help but feel uncomfortable
at all the stares he receives. He chuckles to himself when he realizes how he
must look - a six foot tall man with an eye patch wandering around a place normally
designated for ten year old girls.
She leads him by the hand through the museum, making the occasional 'ooh' and 'ahh' at the various types of dolls, none of which interested him in the least, but he followed her anyway. He even lets her take their picture at the front of the museum, which she later claims she will use to blackmail him.
*
There is more than one room available at this motel, but she insists that they share a room. She tells him that it's because they need to cut their expenses, which is funny, because earlier on he was almost certain they had enough money to have two rooms for the rest of the trip.
When the night comes, she curls up to him like she did the first time, wrapping her arms around him tightly and breathing softly into his chest. She uses the same excuse, that it is cold, which is another thing that strikes him funny because no matter how cold she is she never seems to put on anything thicker, or at least turn down the air conditioning.
*
He awakes with a start, when he
thinks he hears someone calling his name. He cranes his neck slightly to look
around, afraid that the slightest movement would awake the sleeping girl beside
him. He hears nothing but the occasional cricket, and wonders if he lost half
of his sanity together with his left eye.
He scratches his head and reaches for his eye-patch, half expecting it not to
be there. Sometimes he forgets that he is half blind, but sometimes a dull,
throbbing ache where his left eye used to be jolts him back into reality.
He finds himself unable to fall back to sleep, so he focuses his attention on the blonde woman curled up beside him. He takes her hand in his, but this does not seem to stir her. He clasps it gently, feeling the warmth of her skin on his. Looking at her like this, he is not sure if he is beginning to fall in love with her again, but then he realizes that to be impossible, as he never fell out of love with her in the first place. Yet, there is something so comforting about the platonic relationship they share, that if it were to never become anything more than that, he would be satisfied.
*
The bar is crowded, and for a moment he remembers his teenage days at the Bronze, and wonders where all the cool teenagers in Sunnydale hang about now. He sips a little from his drink, and wishes he didn't have to drive so he could indulge in a little more alcohol.
There are some girls who come up to him and want to dance. They think his eye patch is sexy. He laughs and flirts back, but he is not interested in them. Eventually, the girls give up, disappointed, no doubt, but their spirits lift when they find another eligible bachelor across the room.
"Were those girls hitting on you?" Buffy asks as she saunters back to their table, "I can't leave you alone for one minute."
"What can I say? Girls dig the pirate look. Argh, matey."
"Yes, I can see why it's so
attractive," She smiles, "And why aren't you dancing with them?"
"I don't know. I guess I am not in the mood."
"That's too bad. I told that guy over there I couldn't dance with him because you filled up my dance card."
"The old 'I've got a boyfriend' evasion maneuver, I see. I can't help but feel used."
"Sorry," she says, and she pulls her seat closer to his, "But if it makes you feel any better, I was planning on dancing with you anyway."
"Are you sure? Because my depth perception's pretty bad," he answers her, motioning to his eye patch, "I could be stepping on your feet and dancing with your breasts."
"Hmm. That's something you don't hear everyday. But I'll take that risk," She grabs his hand and pulls him up, which is surprisingly easy, because he lets her. She leads him to the dance floor, and draws him closer to her.
The song is a fast number, but she acts as if it is a waltz. She places his hand on her waist, and puts her arms around his neck. They dance close, sometimes even cheek to cheek, oblivious to the stares of the other dancers who just assume that they are probably drunk or insane.
"This is nice, isn't it?" She whispers into his ear, and for a moment he thinks her voice is cracking and she is on the verge of crying, "I missed this."
"I don't recall ever doing this before," He mummers, and suddenly his voice feels course and dry. "Except maybe that one time"
"Don't talk about that," she interrupts him, "And I meant I missed things just being the two of us. Things got so messed up."
"Hey, we're still here, right?"
"Uh-huh," she sighs, as if it is not much of a consolation.
"Seven years and counting."
"Seven years," she repeats, and rests her head on his shoulder, and he moves his hands towards the small of her back. "It's a long time to know someone, isn't it?"
He moves one hand to stroke her hair, and he nods.
Seven years is an even longer time to want something.
*
And he does not know what he is thinking now, as he kisses her and runs his fingers through her hair. She is lying on top of him, one hand on his thigh, another behind his neck, her blouse halfway unbuttoned. She bites his lips softly, and he responds by trailing his fingers down her back.
Her skin feels soft and her breath is warm, and with all the intensity and the passion and his racing hormones, he cannot remember how they got this far. He would blame the single bed, because a man and a woman could only share a bed for so long without going crazy.
He can't remember what they were
talking about, but he remembers that lately they have been having more and more
personal talks that lasted deep throughout the night. And he can't remember
what he said, but he does remember her leaning in and pressing her lips against
his, and pushing him back on the bed. He didn't fight her, because he wanted
it as much as she did.
And now he is half naked lying on the bed which he shared with the woman he
has loved all his life but never got to have. She kisses him on the neck, many
times, and the short gasp of pleasure that rises from his throat seems to encourage
her. He peels her blouse off and traces her shoulder with his finger. He pulls
her closer to him and kisses her again, while his fingers fumble for the clasp
of her bra.
He doesn't know what happens, or why, but she stops, and pulls away from him. She reaches for her blouse and puts it back on, buttoning it slowly. He looks confused, but she smiles and kisses him, softly, on the lips.
"Too fast," she says. "Not now."
He swallows hard, and wonders if she now thinks that all he wants is her body. "I - uh. I'm sorry."
She gives him another smile, and plants a kiss on his cheek. "You're sweet," she says softly, to the point of a whisper, "But I want to do this slowly."
"Me too."
"One step at a time," she mumbles as she lies down beside him and rests her head on his chest, her long blonde hair spilling over his torso like a sea of gold. "I don't want to rush things. For once, I feel I have all the time in the world."
*
She is sleeping now, and he keeps himself busy by watching the trees outside their room cast long shadows that reach up to the edge of their bed, where he has one arm wrapped protectively around her.
He thinks, that, if this were a time much longer ago, he would not have thought this to be possible yet he is happy because he knows it is possible. He hears a soft, rolling thunder in the distance, announcing the future arrival of rain.
One of the last things she did before she fell asleep, was to put her hand on his cheek and say 'You're so beautiful.' He smiled to himself as he replayed this in his mind, wishing he could shout it out to the world. He kissed the top of her head, inhaling the gentle scent of the jasmine shampoo she loved so much.
He fell asleep to the sound of the raindrops drumming themselves on the roof of the motel.
THE END.
"Can I have you?"
Seven years is a long time to want something.
It's been a fun ride. Thank you.