Title: Know Who I Am
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Pairing: Faith/Robin
Spoilers: Chosen post-ep
Summary: When everything's made to be broken, I just want you to know who I am
***
He said that he was going to surprise me when everything was over and done with, and I wasn't sure that I liked the sound of that at the time. That's why I asked him what the surprise was going to be, laughing when he asked me if I was familiar with the meaning of the word. I was familiar with it all right, but in my life, surprises have not always been good things. Pretty recently, a surprise meant someone coming after me with a knife, someone picking a fight wanting to make themselves a reputation, so I guess it's understandable that I could have been a little bit skittish.
It looked for a while there like my luck with surprises was going to keep right on going the way that it always had. That was what I thought when I was crouched beside him at the driver's seat of the school bus, eyeing up the crimson stain on his shirt, not knowing how bad the wound was, trying to convince him, convince myself if it came to that, that he was going to be fine.
When his whole face went blank, staring off into space, I was sure that he was dead. Convinced of it. And for just a moment, all I could see was him teasing me when we were blocking up the exits earlier on, when he was telling me how much prettier he was than me, when he had me ready to jump him right then and there. He told me then that there were decent men in the world, that some of them might surprise me, and while I might not have graduated high school, I wasn't stupid enough to miss what he was telling me. He was saying that he was one of those guys.
He didn't know that one of those guys was what I thought I didn't want. I didn't want a decent guy, one who was going to love me, treat me right, because that's not what I thought I deserved.
That's a pretty heavy thought, and it surprised the hell out of me when I realised it, but it's true. I've never had a relationship with a guy. I've had plenty of one night stands; in fact, that's pretty much all I've ever had. No-one's ever stayed around for me, and I've never wanted anyone to. At least, that's what I told myself, told everyone else. "Get some, get done," that's what I told B once. I really did believe it too. Thought that I was the one in charge, that I was calling all the shots.
Until that day when Robin called me out, and later on, when I was staring into his blank eyes. That's when I remembered what The First said to me, that Buffy would only ever see me as a killer, that the Scooby Gang would never accept me, that no-one would ever love me. I was rattled, told myself that it was just because it was the Mayor, someone who'd meant a lot to me, who had died horribly, not to mention someone from a time in my life that I'm not very proud of, when I was a different person, a person I'm trying very hard to forget.
I jumped a mile when Robin put his hand on my shoulder, gave him plenty of attitude, trying my damnedest to push him away. He walked too, but I called him back, ended up talking to him about the First, what it had said, and he told me what it had said to him too. Talking to him made me feel better, which surprised the hell out of me, and it didn't take much for me to wonder what else he could do to make me feel better.
Let's just say he made me feel a whole lot better and leave it at that, shall we?
Except that I tried to, and couldn't. I found out that much the next day, when I was doling out assignments, and he asked me where I wanted him. Like I say, I might not be the sharpest tool in the box, but I saw the look in his eyes, heard the tone of his voice, and I knew damn well what he was really saying.
Which is why I smacked him down, telling him to wait by his phone, that I'd call him when I needed him.
That should have been it, except that we got assigned to close off all the exits from the school together, and I had to open my big mouth. Don't know what possessed me to do it, and I sure as hell don't know how I ended up practically ordering him onto his back right then and there. I realised later that he played me totally, pressed all the right buttons to get his own way. I should have been annoyed, I should have been ready to kick his ass.
What I was was intrigued.
I've never had a man who was willing to stand up to me before. Never had one who was interested enough to stick around after he'd had me. Never had one who could play me and win.
I'll admit, I was interested. Very interested. And not a little bit nervous.
I wasn't sure why I was nervous, until I was in the front of that bus. Because that's when I tied everything that I'd figured out about myself together in a neat little bow.
That the reason I'd never had a relationship that lasted beyond one night was that I pushed men away before they could push me away. I'd been abandoned by my parents, lost my first Watcher horribly, then there was the whole Sunnydale disaster the first time around… that was more than enough rejection for one lifetime right? No-one in my life had ever cared enough to stick around for me; why should a guy, any guy, be different? Especially a nice guy, a nice guy like Robin, who could have any girl he wanted?
Which is probably the thinking that led to me blowing him off, except that I didn't realise that I'd met my match. That he, for some unknown reason, didn't want to let me go.
Boy's got stamina, in more ways than one.
And he said he was gonna surprise me. I didn't know what with, but I knew it was gonna be interesting. I was all up for kicking a little demon ass, because for the first time in my life, I knew I had something - someone- waiting for me when it was all over.
I didn't expect him to surprise me by dying, and the only thought in my head as I stared into those sightless eyes was "Fuck." I'd finally met a nice guy, was considering starting something up with him, and he went and died on me? I'm no expert on karmic laws and shit, but that just wasn't fair.
Then he came back, looking as freaked as I felt, and managed to whisper "Surprise."
I was surprised all right, and all I could do was smile. Like I said, I knew things were gonna be interesting with him along.
I've gotta say though, I came pretty close to killing him myself for that little stunt.
I didn't though. Instead, we all got back on the bus and trundled on down the highway, away from Sunnydale, or what used to be Sunnydale, only stopping when we came to a deserted motel at the side of the road. There wasn't a soul there, obviously everyone had split along with half the good folks of Sunnydale, so there were beds enough for all of us, even a first aid kit, which we made pretty short work of.
I told Buffy that I'd keep an eye on Robin, tried not to notice the knowing smirk on her face as she nodded and left us to it. Not that there was any funny business. Slaying might make me horny, but killing uber-vamps to avert an apocalypse just leaves me tired, and besides, there was the fact that he had a honking great hole in his side to contend with. Course, we were both tempted. We're in agreement as to our mutual prettiness, and when he heard that I often slept naked, well let's just say that he perked up pretty quickly, though the look of pain that immediately thereafter followed across his face told me loud and clear that the night wasn't going to be about that. A quick check of the closet had us lucking out; a man's shirt, dry cleaned, still in the plastic, left behind and forgotten when the owner split. I disappeared into the bathroom to wash up and change, rolling the sleeves up when they were too long for me, and when I came back out, his eyes were shut. I thought he was asleep, but his eyes opened, blinking slowly at me, and he got that perked up look on his face again, telling me with a sexy smirk that my change of clothing wasn't helping the matter any.
It might not have been helping him, but it was making me feel pretty good, so I just told him to go back to sleep, climbing in beside him. I intended to leave plenty of space between us, but he wasn't having that, reaching out with his left hand, pulling me closer to him. It ended up that my body was pressed against his good side, my head on his shoulder, arm across his body, and he held me all night long.
I've slept with a lot of men, but I'd never just slept with one before. Sometimes I don't sleep well, ghosts of the past coming back to haunt me. But that night, for the first night in a long long time, I slept soundly, only waking up when his hands began to make their way underneath the shirt, tracing patterns on my skin.
I thought I knew how things were going to go, but he had other things in mind. We just lay there, kissing, for a long time, and when he stopped kissing me, he still didn't stop touching me, my skin, my hair, everywhere.
It ended that I was lying on my side, him spooned behind me, face buried in my neck, and while I was enjoying myself perfectly well, I couldn't help but think that I wasn't being straight with him. Because after all, I knew about him. I knew he was the son of a Slayer, that he was a good guy, a strong man. I also knew he had mad issues about vampires, but hey, don't we all? But he didn't know a damn thing about me, and he could have died the day before not knowing a damn thing about me.
Which for some reason freaked me out more than walking into the Hellmouth.
I guess I must have stiffened, made some kind of sign that I wasn't as into things as I had been, because he lifted his head, gave my hands a squeeze, and asked me what was wrong.
So I told him everything.
The whole enchilada, the Faith Chronicles from A to Z. I told him things that I'd never told anyone else before. About my mom, about what she used to do to me. About the next door neighbour who took such an interest in me, the woman my mom used to call a busybody, the woman I liked but never really understood until a few months before my eighteenth birthday when I suddenly got all these superpowers I'd never had before and she revealed herself as my Watcher. I told him about the Cruciamentum, about Kakistos torturing her to death right in front of me, the things he said, how he got off on it. About how guilty I felt, how I felt like it was all my fault, that she wouldn't have been there because of me, that I should have done something to help her. It was after that that I came to Sunnydale, and I told him all about the Mayor, about the things that I did, about the eight month coma and the body switching and what went down in L.A. I told him all about torturing Wesley, and about how I wanted Angel to kill me, begged him to do it. Told him how I'd turned myself in, about the couple of years I spent in jail before breaking out. I finished up with how I came to Sunnydale with Willow because I knew that I was needed there.
"Now you know," I told him quietly, taking a deep breath, waiting for his reaction. Throughout my entire life story, I hadn't turned, hadn't been able to see his face. I could have turned, probably should have, but while I'd faced an army of uber-vamps without turning a hair the day before, there was no way I wanted to see the look on his face if it was the one I was afraid of seeing there. He probably thought he had another Buffy in his arms, and I couldn't take seeing the disappointment in his face when I voluntarily threw myself off whatever pedestal he'd put me on, his ideal of me smashing into a million pieces on the ground, my heart along with it.
The hell of it is though, I had to tell him. Because if there's one thing that I've figured out, it's that if this, whatever the hell it is between us, is going to work, then it can't work with secrets. He needs to know the real me, needs to know who I am.
And for the first time ever in my life, I want someone to know the real me.
Even if he turned away, even if he hated me for it, I still had to tell him.
I was all prepared for a long wait for him to process what I'd told him, but I was wrong. Matter of fact, he barely waited long enough to be sure that I was really finished before he shifted back slightly, and for a second, I thought that he was leaving me. Turned out that he was just leaving enough space that he could pull me down onto my back, so that he was lying on his good side, looking down at me, the same smirk on his face that he'd had when he pulled that stunt on me in the bus.
"That everything?" he asked. "Or is there something else you want to share with me?"
He was teasing me. I'd just laid my soul bare to him, and he was teasing me, like he didn't know, or didn't care, how hard it had been for me to talk to him like that. I was about to call him on it when he continued with, "Because if not, there are certain other things that we could be doing…" His voice trailed off as his lips met mine, and that's when I figured it out.
He knew what I'd done in my past, he knew what I was. He knew it all, and it didn't matter to him. Even after everything I'd done, everything I'd been, he still wanted me.
Just when I thought I knew what was what, he surprised me, this time in a very good way.
Damn, but a girl could get used to this.