Yeah, I am. I always have been. What's your soddin' point? Ever met a vamp who's not? Or for that matter, a mortal?
We're all a selfish, greedy lot. But I'm at least fessin' up to it. Fessin' up to feeling my heart nearly burst as she walked down those steps. Even though her eyes were bleak and her hands were bloody, my first reaction wasn't for her.
It was for me.
But you gotta give a bloke credit. I at least had enough self-control not to cry like a nancy-boy until I was away from her. Away from them.
Them. Each of them unthinkably more selfish than I, and that's sayin' a lot. Each of them 'cept Lil Bit, who never asked for anything. Not once did she ask for the Slayer back.
Perhaps she prayed for it, as I did. But I'll warrant her prayers were heard more than mine, prayers to a God I had defied long ago, prayers to a God I had laughed at. Prayers to a God I had, more than once, flipped the bleedin' bird with the blood of innocents flowing down my face and neck.
Yup, I'm pretty damned sure if Dawn had prayed for her sis, it would be much more effective than the irreverent sobs I offered up.
Never once had I sought her back, though. No matter how irrational I got—self-destructive, hands thrust into the sunlight, smoke rising off skin—no matter how numb I got, I never looked to bring her back. Only they…
They all acted so friggin' shocked. Shocked that they'd jerked her from the only moments of rest she'd ever known. The only moments not interrupted by Slayer dreams and Slayer sense and Slayer duty and Slayer righteousness.
The only moments when she didn't have to worry that one or another of them was bollocksing things up… again… and again… and again.
And how could they be so surprised at what they'd done, selfish to think they'd done right? To think that she… beautiful, shining, good… she would have gone to a place of torment. A place for the likes of me. It wasn't as though she'd fallen into the portal and stayed… she came out the other side, and so it stood to reason…
It stood to reason that the Slayer had finally risen to what she had always been, glowing angelic, beautifully bright, beautifully right.
"I was in heaven," she told me, only me, in half-light, half darkness, her friends only a heartbeat away, her death only a temporary respite, her duties only shortly interrupted, her mind only tentatively holding on.
"I know," I wanted to say, but I kept my mouth shut.
I'd like to think it's because she needed me to, but if I'm completely honest—and have I ever been anything but?—it's because I wanted her to keep thinkin' she'd confided in me. Me and no one else.
I kept my mouth shut for one reason.
I'm selfish.
I always have been.
So what's your soddin' point?
