Author's Note: Drabble written for the LJ sunday100 challenge. Subject: firsts. Spoilers for Season 7 "Dirty Girls."

Waking Up to a Nightmare

By Trisana McGraw

When Xander awoke, he was in a hospital room, with blackness in his left eye. Uncomprehending, he placed his hand over the patch covering half of his face and pushed it, gasping at the red-hot pain.

He tried to flutter his eyelashes behind the patch, but he saw nothing . . .

. . . because there was nothing there.

He wanted to cry, but he couldn't, not just from shock but also from something wrong with the hole in his socket. For the first time, it really hit him: his left eye was gone, irreplaceable, empty.

He couldn't cry, but he could scream perfectly well.