"I was happy. Wherever I was, I was happy. At peace.
I knew that everyone I cared about was all right. I knew it."
I lied to him.
I lied to him, and is that such a surprise? I had convinced myself long before, years before, that lying was necessary for my part in life. Lies flowed from my mouth as easily as, more easily than, truths. They had for quite some time.
i love you, riley.
i understand, giles.
it's okay, xander.
i hate you, spike.
And wouldn't you have lied, too, when everyone around you expected something different? And all you had to do to live up to their expectations was lie, just a little, and no one got hurt.
Except me.
"I knew that everyone I cared about was all right."
I had glimpses.
Glimpses with my non-eyes as my friends walked away carrying my body, crying, shellshocked, but they were all leaning on each other, and I knew they would be okay. I was gone, but they had each other, and so they would be just fine.
But one person walked away from the tower alone, one person slipped through the shadows as though he were part of them. One person blamed himself, and had no one to tell him otherwise.
I watched with my entire being as he stumbled through the graveyard, coat slapping clumsily around his legs with gracelessness uncharacteristic of him. I watched as he left the door of his crypt hanging open, dropping to his knees in the middle of the floor.
Everyone I cared about was not all right.
He smashed a chair, gathering up splinters as a miser gathers up gold, and I saw him drive the shards of wood into his chest, laughing madly.
"Stop. You don't have to watch, you know. Things will all turn out." My mother's voice at first, adding to the warmth around me, blinding my glimpses with added white. When I fought the white and struggled to see, the voice changed to mine. "He's damned anyway, so what does it matter?"
I don't know.
It just does.
And so another voice cut through the white.
Gone. It just figures in a world like this that I'm still alive and she's fucking gone. Are you with her, Joyce? Are you takin' care of her? I hope she's—safe he had meant to say happy but what did he care if i was happy as long as i was safe for once safe as he had been unable to keep me I hope she's safe and I'll keep hers safe here on earth. How does it hurt so much?
I saw again as he balanced on his knees in the middle of the floor, rocking and laughing and crying, sobbing with breath that he didn't even need.
"Stop him." It was my voice this time, my voice spoken to… whom? Who would stop the damned from his pain?
And I glimpsed no more.
"I knew that everyone I cared about was all right."
He'll never know that I saw otherwise. Because wouldn't that mean stopping the lie?
Wouldn't that mean I cared about him?
