Chapter Four: Willow
Willow hummed a little tune as she threw some hellebore, fleabane, bindweed, salamander eyes stuff into a pot. She was working on Buffy's present. Something she had been trying for almost ten years. And the witch was gonna get it right this time. She began to chant. "Spirits of the light, I invoke thee. Let the gloom of darkness part before you, let the moonlight be made pale by your presence. Spirits..." A greenish circle of light appeared and hovered over the bowl. "Spirits of light, grant my wishes... bring forth the energy that controls all life. Solis Luminarium."
The circle of light exploded and contracted into a bright, white-yellow ball. Presto! Buffy's ball o' sunlight. Willow smiled happily at Selene who watched from her crib. "Did you see that Selene? Mommy's good."
"Of course she is," Kennedy replied breezing into the room. She kissed Willow on the forehead. "She's the best."
"Thanks, baby," Willow said. She caught the ball in pretty, UV-protected, glass bottle and examined it. "Do you know how long it's taken me to do this?"
"How long?" Kennedy asked picking up toys and throwing them into the toy chest Xander made them.
"Ten years," Willow sighed. "Ten years, I've been working on this for her, and now she really doesn't need it."
Kennedy looked at the bottle, "Yeah, but she'll love it."
Willow wrapped the bottle in tissue paper and put it in a small gift bag. "I hope so. I hope it's not like a bad reminder for her."
Kennedy shook her head, "It won't be."
"Yeah but, she quit slaying after David..." Willow took the bottle from the package. "It's not a good gift. What was I thinking?"
Kennedy took the bottle from Willow. "You were thinking with your heart. That's the best gift anyone could give."
"But..."
"But what? So she quit. It wasn't the first time. And it's not like she really needed to do it anymore. There are enough of us around, she can live a normal life now."
Willow looked at her slayer. She wasn't fully convinced, but she knew Kennedy was right. "All right."
"All right." Kennedy handed her back the bottle and Willow put it back into the bag. Kennedy and Willow kissed and Kennedy stood up. "I'll go back the baby bag and we'll leave in an hour."
"Okay," Willow watched her lover walk into the other room. That girl was hot. She didn't feel guilty thinking about it either. Not anymore. Of course, she missed Tara and loved her, but she couldn't let it consume her, not again. Plus, she was in love with Kennedy, they'd been through hell together. Literally. Kennedy, Faith, Rona and Vi got trapped in a hell dimension a year after Sunnydale, and Willow, Buffy, Xander, Dawn, Giles, Robin, Angel, Fred, Wesley, Gunn and Andrew, all helped to get them out. Willow wasn't going to lose another lover, so she and Buffy went there, were almost eaten by a giant bug demon, and saved them from being sacrificed into a fiery pit. It was wild.
That had been the last time they were all together. Giles took most of the new slayers to England, help them train with the few remaining Watchers. Angel and his gang returned to their lives, Dawn became pregnant and had Billy at eighteen, which of course made Buffy want to kill her. Dawn was the first to get married and settle down. Xander, Willow and Faith all followed Buffy to the Cleveland Hellmouth, where Xander met Teresa, his wife, while battling a Grillk demon on the college campus. They married a year later and moved back to California where she was from. Willow and Kennedy went to help Angel in L.A. Faith and Robin headed back to New York, while Andrew decided to stay and help Giles, until he met Veronica at a Stargate: SG 1 convention and romance ensued.
Buffy went back to help Dawn four years after Sunnydale. She crashed her car into a pole on a stormy night and was unconscious when a young man found her. They fell in love, married and had Hope. A year later, David, Buffy's husband, was killed by a group of renegade vampires who wanted to send the slayer a message. Of course, after that Buffy took off, left Hope in Willow's care, and was gone for a year. When Buffy came back, she was better. Willow didn't now what happened that entire time, but nine months later, Buffy had Madison.
It had been a strange eight years. But everything seemed to be coming together now. Their lives weren't as crazy as they had been. They were all married and had families. Willow, Xander, Dawn, and Buffy all lived within twenty miles of each other in Calabasas, California. Life was good, and soon they'd be together again, to celebrate Buffy's birthday.
"Are you ready?" Kennedy asked carrying a small bag and handing Willow her purse.
"Yep, let's go." Willow scooped Selene up and buckled her in her car seat.
After a few minutes, Kennedy glanced over at Willow who was looking out the window and sighing. "What's wrong?"
"Oh nothing."
"Thinking about seeing them?"
"Yeah. The last time we were all together was Christmastime. That was almost a month ago."
"And it was warm," Kennedy noted as she passed a blue car.
Willow nodded. "You know, maybe we should make it a point to get together more often."
"More often? We get together every major holiday. And sometime in between," Kennedy told her.
"Oh, I'm sorry 'Ms. I Have a Rich Family and We Hate Each Other'..."
"Hey!"
Willow smoothed her hair back. "I'm sorry."
Kennedy shrugged. "It's true. I hardly ever saw my parents growing up. Only every Christmas and Thanksgiving, when the boarding school had to send us home."
"It's okay, I never saw my parents either. And I lived in then same house," Willow said.
"But you're right. We should all see each other more. It's not like we have lives or anything." Kennedy said.
Willow sighed again. But it was a happy sigh. "That's just it. Now we have lives. Lives with families. No more demons or vampires to slay. Just normal lives."
"Okay how normal are we?" Kennedy asked. "We're a gay, you're a witch, I'm a slayer, Buffy's a slayer, Faith's a slayer, Dawn's a Key, Xander's, well, Xander, Giles is British, and Andrew's a dork. You call that normal?"
Willow smiled. "As normal as they come."
(I had to make up the rest of Willow's spell which I took from the episode "Triangle". If you know the right one, please let me know, and I can fix it. Thanks!).
