Adjustment – Part XXI
A shiver went through Wesley as he stood in the shadowed corner of the sidewalk at the entrance to the underground parking lot of Wolfram & Hart anxiously awaiting Angel's return. His anxiety is what led him to stand out in the bitter cold with biting wind whistling past him without a single regard to him. He didn't want to even waist the time of Angel walking inside before he got to speak with him. A strange mixture of relief and disquiet filled the inside of his chest as Angel finally drove into the parking lot in his favorite company car, the Viper. Wesley quickly walked over to the stopped car now in it's designated parking spot. Angel quickly got out of the car having noticed Wesley waiting for him.
"What's wrong?" Wesley took a deep breath after glancing into the vehicle hoping Angel had perhaps brought with him a certain passenger.
"Well," Wesley answered with a pause trying to find the best way of explanation.
"Let's walk as you talk," Angel abruptly ordered wanting to go see her. They entered the building and Angel maintained his quick pace seeing the Wesley's speed only encouraged him to go faster. "What's going on?" he asked only taking a breath once they were standing in the elevator.
"Well, this morning I went in to check on her since I hadn't seen her about and she wasn't in bed as I suspected and-"
"Wesley, a little less English and a little more point."
"She was very upset… inconsolable even… she seemed ill too. I want to know what the bloody hell is going on!" Wesley finally shouted losing his patience. Wesley's dramatic words were of high impact, but their effect was immediately forgotten with the opening of the door to Faith's quarters.
"Faith?" Angel called very softly. There was no response and Wesley led him over to the bathroom where the door was partially ajar. Angel looked in cautiously and his heart dropped as he saw her vomiting into the toilet. He stood there unsure of what to do before he felt Wesley push past him and walk into the bathroom. He walked over to the sink and wet a small towel and wrung it out.
"Have a few drinks last night?" Angel asked as she sat back down on the floor and leaned her back against the wall.
"No," she answered unsteadily. Angel looked over at Wesley doubting she was being truthful but Wesley confirmed her candor with a subtle shake of his head as he offered her the towel. She took it and pressed it against her forehead but immediately jerked back and Angel saw the reason for it was a cut running through her eyebrow and up her forehead.
As if she suddenly realized Angel was standing there she looked out of the bathroom behind Angel as if looking for someone.
"He didn't come, did he?" she asked shakily.
"No, why would he?" Angel tone was a little uncharacteristic due to him still being angry with Xander and the entire situation. He almost felt angry at Faith for feeling so strongly about Xander.
"Never mind," she answered spitefully. Even now she still held onto a thin thread of hope that maybe Xander would come walking through the door, kneel down next to her and hold her tightly telling her that all the pain was going to go away again and it would be just like it was.
"What's wrong?" Angel asked trying to make his tone softer and more consoling.
"Nothing… I'm fine."
"Wesley, could you…" Angel asked motioning for him to leave. To his surprise, the response he received was against his request and in a strong way. Angel motioned to talk with him outside of the bathroom and both of them exited.
"Why should I leave?" Wesley asked angrily.
"Wesley…"
"You left me with her and now you want to come back with an attitude and you not only expect her to talk to you but you want me to leave her to you?"
"Wesley…"
"I just can't believe you!" he stated outraged. "Did it occur to you that maybe the only thing she's been hoping for since you left was that you'd return with him?"
"He doesn't deserve-"
"You don't deserve to make that judgment. Granted I don't know everything going on here, but I've figured out the main gist and-"
"I'm sorry… I'm just… I'm angry. I'm a little on edge right now and-"
"Don't take it out on her. You're not with them anymore, you're here with her and you have to stop talking like-"
"I'm sorry. I-" he stopped hearing coughing coming from the bathroom. "I need to talk to her alone… she doesn't like to look weak in front of you." Without a response Wesley left the apartment glancing quickly in the bathroom trying to sooth his nerves. Angel walked back over to the doorway to the bathroom. He looked over at her and it felt like the sun was melting him from the inside outward. Between the cut on her face and the thick layer of sweat covering her face, neck and arms he felt sick.
"When did you get sick?"
"I woke up this way."
"Why?"
"Does it matter?"
"What's the cut from?"
"We playing twenty questions?"
"No, I was just wondering why your face is bleeding, that's all."
"Making you hungry?" she asked looking up at him angrily.
"What's the matter with you?" he asked losing his composure at the fact that she was acting like he had done something terrible to her since he walked into the room.
"Sorry, I'm in kind of a bad mood… I've been here puking with a pounding headache wondering whether you went to Slayer H.Q.'s to shack up with Buffy or to give Xander a time out… or maybe it's just cause I've got a bad attitude." She tossed the towel Wesley had given her onto the floor and slowly got to her feet – very slowly.
"You're in pretty bad shape," Angel mentioned just trying to find something that would help him break through to her right now. She was on high defense, as usual, but right now she was in pain too, and if he wasn't on edge already, having to see her like this was certainly not helping.
"You always were the sharp one," she muttered sardonically as she walked past him out of the bathroom and into the bedroom of the quite spacious, Wolfram & Hart apartment. He followed her quietly, making himself not snap back at her comments. This was the way she was – especially at times like this.
Why was it that when he really needed to be able to deal with her that he was finding it so difficult? He knew what it was though – he was frustrated. He had gone to Buffy's not expecting anything but to be able to find some magical solution. Seeing the pain she was in made him irrational and knowing that he couldn't just fix it for her frustrated it for him. And ironically, he took that anger out on her.
"So what happened to your forehead?" he pressed. He pushed on the one question knowing if he couldn't get her to answer a simple question like this he wasn't going to get anywhere.
"It's an interesting story actually – it instigated a fight with the door knob…" she paused for dramatic effect and Angel hung on her last word waiting for her to continue. "Actually, it's not that interesting," she admitted with a shrug. She walked over to the window and picked up a glass of water she had left on the sill.
"So what happened?" he asked again.
"Oh… the door knob won," she answered bluntly. Angel was sure to make sure she couldn't hear the deep breath he needed to take.
"What's with your foreheads sudden violence?"
"No," she answered finally with a slow shake of her head, "I told you, I woke up feeling like ass and I went into the bathroom there and I sat down and I hit my head."
"Looks like you sat down pretty hard," he commented looking at the pretty deep gash on her forehead. "You sure you didn't fall?"
"We gonna argue semantics now? Sitting is a controlled fall, isn't it?"
"Okay," he agreed, "but that doesn't look too controlled."
"I don't know," she finally admitted, "I kind of blacked out for a second… we'll say it started out as a 'controlled fall' and whether it ended as one or not is up to interpretation…" He watched her carefully as she sipped carefully at the water as though if it might shatter in her mouth. After a few very small sips which barely changed the level of the liquid in the glass she placed it down on the floor near the bed and trying not to seem like she really needed to sit down she did so very slowly. Her eyes were extremely bloodshot and had heavy, dark bags under them only further accentuated by the paleness of her face.
"You blacked out? What's wrong with you… you really don't look good."
"You know just how to make a girl feel special, don't you? I can see why B had such a thing for you," she commented sarcastically.
"I mean it – why are you sick? Slayer's aren't really supposed to get sick like this."
"You remember that promise you made me?" she asked. He felt like he was being thrown a curve ball and stood there scanning his brain for possible answers. "You said that there was one thing you could promise me, and that was that what I had done would haunt me, probably for the rest of my life…"
"Yeah," he nodded understandingly.
"Well, let's just say I wish you were just another shmuck who didn't keep your promises."
"But I don't understand – why are you-"
"Sometimes it's really bad… I'll see flashes of everything that I've done or been through… everything… it just flashes through my head at a million miles an hour but I can see everything so clear and even more than that, I feel everything hit me that I felt. All of the emotions and pain and… everything, it just all hit me and it's enough of a rollercoaster to literally make me sick. I feel everything – I see everyone and what I did… I see the blood on my hands and I feel the fluster in my stomach and I really can't handle it anymore…" she babbled painfully.
"So this is about that, not Xander?"
"I don't know," she admitted, "when I was with him I'd wake up like I did this morning and, I don't know what he did, but he would just… he would just hold me… he would hold me and talk to me and everything would just slow down… and then I could handle it and sometimes it would even go away… Angel, I can't handle it anymore," she admitted, "with him I was able to deal with all this shit going on in my head, but I really don't know if I can by myself… I want to be done." She stood up off of the bed and walked over to a table across the room with her jacket strewn on top of it. She rummaged through the pockets and pulled out her pack of cigarettes. She opened the pack and began to remove a cigarette but then feeling the queasiness in her stomach placed it back on the table still holding the lighter in her hand out of habit.
"Faith, you got on this rollercoaster the day you walked into the Mayor's office… you can't just decide the rides over now," he answered trying to not sound harsh but needing to maintain the same degree of firmness needed to make sure she realized still what she did was wrong. "You had an awesome time on the first half of the ride…"
"Second half, not so much," she added spitefully. "But you know… it's like at the carnival, you're on the huge ride and if you scream loud enough sometimes they'll stop it for you so you can get off, and Angel, I'm screaming as loud as I can!"
"Faith you've got people around you who are listening. You can't forget that…"
"I know you're listening, but I just don't think anyone can actual hear it…"
"Faith, I-"
"Whatever," she said tiredly cutting him off. She wasn't trying to keep him from speaking but she just couldn't listen to anymore or think about anything with her head spinning around so quickly. It began to speed up again since she was starting to think about her emotions and that was what fueled everything inside of her head…
"No, it's not whatever!" Angel began reprimanding.
*'I can't handle it without you… I just can't. Baby, don't leave… I'll do anything, I need you… you don't know how much it hurts… I can't do it without you, baby, please don't leave me…'*
"Angel," she called almost in a panic as she lost feeling in her legs and the room began to spin around her so quickly it felt slow. She grabbed for the table behind her but she barely felt her hand touch it before she blacked out. Angel rushed over to her practically being able to see her consciousness pulled away from her in a whirlwind of force. He caught her limp body just as her legs were on the floor, able to catch her upper body before it struck the ground.
Almost in a panic he looked frantically around the room for something cold but all he could see was the water across the room by the bed. He then began to blow on her face hoping it would help bring her back – after a few breaths he realized he didn't have any breath…
"Problem," he announced. On the brink of ultimate panic he felt her breathe in a deep gasp of air and grab his arm in her tight grasp. "Faith… oh my god… I'm making a rule – that's not allowed…" he said with as much levity as he could muster. All quickly disappeared when he looked down at her and saw her begin to cry.
"I just want to be done, Angel. Why can't I be done? It just hurts too much…" Angel had a painful recollection of Darla for reasons he both understood and didn't. Everything was very much the same but at the same time very different. He loved her and he could openly admit to almost anyone that that was the true state of his feelings – but it wasn't that type of love. He deeply cared about her and for her, but it was in no way a sexually based attraction. There was something very sensual about their relationship but he in no way felt a sexual tension between himself and her. He was aware that at one point that was very much all she was interested in when it came to him but he was also very much aware that there was a lot more going on with her then with plenty of ulterior motives floating around. She was going through a lot of the same things that Darla had been going through when she got her soul returned to her by Wolfram& Hart. Begrudgingly he had to recognize the building he was presently standing in.
"Faith, why don't you lie down for a little while," he suggested beginning to help her stand.
"No," she protested shaking her head, "I don't want to go to sleep…"
"Well… you should rest. I want to go to Wesley and do a little research – I want to make sure this isn't some demon manipulating this situation and making you think that all of this is about Xander when it's really doing something to you-"
"Angel, this isn't new."
"Faith, that wasn't normal… heartbreak, yeah… hangover, sure… passing out for no reason, not buying it…"
"Whatever," she answered pushing away his helping hand. She stood up charily then slowly walked over to the glass of water. Knowing he probably shouldn't leave but also being aware that his fragile nerves right now were getting him nowhere with her he turned and exited the room wanting to be back as soon as possible but also needing to take a breath of fresh air outside of her room. She heard the clicking of the door behind her and she shoved the glass of water onto the floor from its resting position on the sill. She wiped a stray tear from her face angrily – she felt helpless, weak, and useless!
He was finally back but he wasn't really… He felt like he was just as far away as he was when he was gone. What happened while he was gone? Why was he being so weird? All of these questions dragged around in her head but even with them occupying her she couldn't help but allow others to fog her mind as well. What did Xander say? How did he feel? Did he even care how she felt?
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"Hungry?" Willow asked as she walked into Faith's old bedroom. It had become clear that Xander wasn't going to stay anywhere else. She walked in and saw him sitting there in a room lighted only by the moon outside the window and a few stray street lamps. He was sitting on the unkempt bed and appeared as though looking up at her was the first time he had looked up from the floor since he came in here hours earlier.
Willow had become especially concerned once Angel had left – seeing Xander around the house had become a rare if ever occurrence. She was worried… she had known Xander forever and she was used to him dealing with his problems alone, but it made her uncomfortable to see him literally disappear. She hated to even allow the thought to enter her mind, but she had to realize that since Faith had left it had gone completely down hill. She soothed this thought slightly by analyzing that if she had never come back at all it would've been even better…
"No, I've got to get ready for work."
"Don't you need to eat before you go to work?" she asked with a comforting smile.
"They give me this strange thing now… it's… oh, what's it called… right, lunch breaks," he stated sardonically. Both of them couldn't deny how Faith-like what he said was but Willow tried to push past that.
"Breakfast is more what I had in mind," she added motioning towards the digital clock which Xander had replaced on the table beside the bed. He glanced towards the clock and saw the glowing 5:47a.m. He nodded knowing to himself that he hadn't slept all night and had been staring at that face of the clock sporadically since around midnight. When he wasn't looking at the neon green glowing digits he was either looking down at the dark floor or at the pictures he still was holding in his hands.
"Umm… I'm not really hungry, Will, thanks though…"
"Is everything okay?" she asked cautiously.
"Yeah," he answered a little too quickly. He fidgeted nervously on the bed for a moment realizing how quickly he had answered.
"You can talk to me you know…"
"I don't really want to talk about-" he stopped himself as quickly as he could which was still way too late. "I know… thank you."
"Xander, you're-"
"I'm fine," he stated just as quickly but much more firmly.
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"Wesley," Angel called as he walked up to his office. Wesley looked up from his desk to see Angel walking in anxiously.
"What is it?"
"It's… Wesley, I thought I had most of this whole thing figured out but now I'm not so sure anymore."
"Why the sudden change of heart?" he asked still not completely sure what he was getting at. He felt a little in the dark on the whole situation but whenever things came to Faith he had become somewhat used to being in the dark.
"Wesley, I don't know – I thought I understood, but I don't think what I think it is could bring everything to such an extreme… like it was… I mean, yeah, really upset and even depressed, but not passing out and being ill… I don't think… right?"
"I pride myself in being able to decrypt a third of what you just said. Perhaps you could explain to me exactly what you thought you understood…"
"Okay… I mean, I understood why, well I thought I did, about Faith. About why this whole thing with Xander bothered her so much. I mean, just think about it – her entire life she's heard nothing but people telling her that she's completely useless, worthless, and replaceable. I mean everyone from her mother to any authority figures she had to…" he trailed off looking back up at Wesley knowing he wanted to say him. "Wesley, that's all she heard growing up… I mean, that wasn't the only thing she had to deal with but I really believe that's the root of everything deep down inside of her. I mean, it made sense – it explained a lot of her behaviors. She acts like she doesn't care what anyone thinks about her but really, she does.
"When it comes to sleeping around with guys she doesn't know… that makes sense too because as much as she doesn't show it, even if it's just some guy who she knows is lying, they act like they care about her, they tell her they need her, treat her kind of special… she goes for it. She absolutely craves feeling that way! And with Xander, right from the beginning she had that… Xander's a nice guy, probably something she hadn't dealt with a lot before meeting him. He went to her when she needed help – granted she didn't know how to handle it at the time – she still knew that it made her feel good.
"When they were together he was the first person to really make her feel wanted – he was the first person to tell her all of those things she had never heard before and really mean it. I mean, Wesley, to finally have someone who absolutely accepted her – and I mean everything about her. He… he made her feel loved, Wesley! She's *never* felt that before… then he tells her it wasn't true. He tells her that what he said, the only person who's ever said it and made her feel like he actually meant it, he didn't and that it was all just a lie.
"How could she think anything but that what she's been told her whole life is true? So I can see her upset… I can see her being depressed – very much so actually, especially when all of this is on top of everything she's going through. But Wesley, is it enough to make her physically sick like she is right now?"
"The mind is a very powerful thing… Angel, it's important to remember that no matter how well she's doing, how good she seems, Faith is a very sick girl. She's sick, Angel… very sick."
"Tell me she's sick one more time Wesley and you're going to see that by comparison," he spat defensively.
"More credit to her, Angel," he continued remaining composed throughout the entire conversation, "she's dealt with so much for a girl her age – it's extraordinary… but… Angel, we must all understand that-"
"Wesley, why is she passing out and throwing up?"
"She passed out?" he asked, his level of concern rising even higher.
"What's going on, Wesley, I need to know."
"Well, we've all seen what Faith's mind has led her to do to others in the past… how far it took her to the other side and how long she stayed there. It was all about the mind games she plays being played on herself. Only then she took it out on others… now she's taking it out on herself. I think we're both aware of the damage she can do… just imagine that exponentially since it doesn't need to be physically materialized, it only needs to remain in her head."
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Willow sat on the couch in the living room with stacks of papers sprawled about the table in front of her as well as on the floor and on her lap, not to mention all over the couch. They had begun to seriously network as well as they could and try and figure out which girls had been given Slayer powers seeming as how they're fix for the first could probably develop into something much worse. She was driven by the thought of a billion Faith's… not a good world. She had print outs of suspicious imprisonments of minors, school uprisings, etc. It was a lot of things to sift through and hard to determine which had to do with Slayers and which had to do with rowdy teenagers.
The phone rang just as she picked up a file. She placed it back down and answered the phone.
"Hello?"
"Hi… Willow, it's Faith." Willow hesitated answering for a longer moment than she realized. Faith was the last person she thought would be on the other end of the phone call and she didn't sound too great. She sounded tired and her voice was raspy and more tired sounding then usual. It was enough for her to notice that there was a fairly drastic change. "Sorry, umm… I…"
"No, it's fine," Willow interjected. She hadn't realized how long that uncomfortable pause had been. "How are you?"
"You know me," she answered typically.
"Right… you sound a little-"
"Is Xander there?" she asked as though she had to spit it out or she was never going to be able to ask. The tone of her voice was enough to even make Willow feel terrible that he actually wasn't.
"No, I'm really sorry… he's not here, but if you want me to tell him you called…"
"No, it's okay," she answered, her tone trying to cover up her disappointment. Willow could hear her exhaling, signally to her that she must be smoking. "I just called to find out if he got that job… you know the one he went to the interview when I left…"
"Yeah," Willow answered, happier that she could help with something positive. "He's actually there now, that's why he's not home."
"That's so good," she answered as though she were thinking out loud.
"Do you want me to give him a message?" Willow offered again.
"No, it's okay… I was really just wondering if he got that job or not," she explained. "Thanks, Willow… I've got to go, so I'll talk to you later."
"Okay… take care of yourself, Faith…" Willow answered but she was fairly sure she wasn't heard when the click from Faith hanging up interrupted the phrase. She hung up the phone and picked up the file again but remained staring at the manila folder for several minutes unable to think of anything except Faith and Xander. She didn't dare to claim that she knew Faith – the girl never ceased to confused the shit out of her. But she definitely had just called to ask if the guy who broke her heart had gotten the job he was trying for the day she moved out… the little that she knew about Faith, that wasn't typical and it meant she wasn't lying when she said it had been on her mind. She could picture Faith pacing back and forth for hours before letting herself pick up that phone to call. Before she had picked up that phone if anyone asked her what she thought about Faith and Xander she would've said she was happy that Xander had ended things before he got hurt, but hearing the tone of Faith's voice when she had to tell her that he wasn't there was enough to make her rethink her answer.
There was a lot of pain in her tone… more so than usual. She wasn't president of Faith's fan club but she could admit the chick had been through a lot. Just listening to the tone of her voice on the phone had been enough to make her temporarily forget about Xander, and how she had been relieved that he was going to be out of harms way, and she became concerned with Faith and was able to see how downhill she had gone. Noticing that made it impossible for her to ignore the fact that Xander had also gone downhill, perhaps even on just as steep a slope. She knew Faith must be in a pretty bad way to be calling like that and admitting that she called to talk to him and just ask him about a job – she hadn't even put on a front and tried to act tough and indifferent. She called sounding tired, upset, and even desperate.
Kennedy walked down from upstairs and walked into the living room. She saw Willow staring blankly at the open file and she asked with concern,
"Is everything alright?" Willow snapped out of her temporary daze,
"Yes, I'm fine. I just kind of blanked out…" Kennedy sat down on the couch next to her in a spot that was free of papers.
"Who was that on the phone, I heard it ring…"
"Faith, actually." Kennedy was just as surprised as Willow had been. It was obvious to her lover from her expression that she was extremely curious and overwhelmed with various emotions now.
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"Bye, Xander," several coworkers called as they walked off the site. Xander waved goodbye to all of his new pals and began to gather up his things ready to head out. He was going to stop by Buffy and Dawn's house to check in on the hot water heater – he had been suspicious about it's reliability from the beginning – and now Buffy and been complaining that the water wasn't getting more than lukewarm.
"Harris!" his boss called unexpectedly.
"Sir, how are you?" he greeted respectfully. He wiped his hand off in his shirt before offering a handshake.
"Harris, I have a question for you."
"Yes sir."
"How would you like to head a new project we have over in the downtown area?"
"Head it?"
"Yes, I want to put you in charge of the project. You seem plenty qualified from what I've seen. Are you up for it? But before you answer that, Harris, let me tell you – unless that girl of yours is back and occupying all of your free time I wouldn't pass this one up," he joked.
"I'm on it, Sir."
"Good man, Harris. Congratulations; I'll see you tomorrow to go over the prints."
"Yes sir."
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Faith had called Slayer HQ's while lying on her bed trying to steady her pounding head and spinning stomach. After hanging up the phone with Willow she had hardly moved except to put out her cigarette and to wipe her eyes from all of her, umm… allergies. She hadn't slept in days and the slight tears and exhaustion was enough to ease her into a slight nap. Even as she fell asleep she was still chiding herself for allowing herself to have anything she wanted anymore – even when it was just sleep – because she knew she just shouldn't. She didn't want to see anymore faces… she didn't want to feel anymore emotions… memories for her were horrible and something she wished she could avoid. While awake she could usually control them enough to keep them out of her head but while she was asleep there was no limit to how graphic or haunting they could be.
------dream------
She walked into a bar and took a seat on a stool that seemed somehow familiar. A figure walked over to her that revealed itself as Lorne.
'I'm usually the one on the receiving end, gorgeous, but what'll you have?'
'Don't worry, I'm usually not getting shit I'm just doing all the leg work, so we're both on unsteady ground…' she explained, 'let me start out with a Jack and Coke…' Lorne quickly produced one with a wave of his hand and placed it down in front of her. A hand quickly appeared next to her placing money down on the bar,
'It's on me,' Buffy's voice revealed. Faith turned and looked at her strangely. Lorne took the money off of the bar and disappeared behind the shadowed bar.
'Since when are you buying me drinks?'
'Seemed like the least I could do…'
'Whatever.'
'What's going on with you?'
'Got a lot going on in my head…'
'What, you mean like me popping in for random visit in it?' she asked with a laugh.
'You've got the whole, still being alive thing going for you, don't worry,' she answered with an equal amount of levity.
'Can I ask you a question?' she asked. She took her silence as admission and continued, 'what happened to the whole get over it attitude you usually have?'
'I knew it could feel like this so I never let it… but everything happened and I just needed it so bad… and I couldn't lie about it anymore – it felt so good to have someone who loved me that losing that… I mean, I don't know…'
'It's so confusing. You know how I love riddles, right?'
'Yeah – the best one though is, 'is it better to have loved and lost…' '
'or 'to have never loved at all' ' she chimed in.
'I don't know!' she answered angrily as though being pushed for an answer.
'It hurts so much… I can't breathe.'
'It never goes away, does it?'
'Watch out!' she yelled. Faith jumped up out of her stool and in front of a huge wolf jumping towards Buffy. She blocked it from getting to Buffy and struggled with it to keep it's wildly snapping jaws from contacting with her face. She could feel every ounce of her strength slowly tiring as she struggled to gain an inch with the wild beast. She just couldn't let it win – but she couldn't keep it down.
'Buffy, help me!' she cried out desperately as she felt it slowly gaining ground on her. Buffy's face flashed quickly past her then she was gone. She lost her focus as her eyes followed Buffy's disappearing face and she quickly felt her mistake as the wolf leaped up again, knocking her down onto her back. She held her hands up above her face to try and grab hold of it's scruff again to maintain it's distance away from her but it attacked mercilessly, sinking it's teeth into her hands and wrists before making it to it's real goal by her face and neck. She didn't scream… she didn't scream at all… the pain was there, she felt it, but it didn't matter. It's what she almost liked about pain – it made you forget about all of the other shit going on and it made you just focus on one thing. She left… they all just left… they said they wouldn't but in the end that's what they do. She was alone and it was because they left her.
------dream over--------
Buffy woke up with a jerk – sitting up quickly, rubbing her eyes to wipe away the fog. She'd had bazaar dreams before, it kind of came with the Slayer territory, but this one won the prize. First Faith buys her a drink in a bar, then she gets her to talk about Angel, while Faith's quoting Shakespeare!? If she were in charge of writing her dreams, she joked in her head, Faith definitely would've said something more along the lines of, damn this shit sucks.
Either way the dream was really weird. She sat there for another moment but then she finally realized there was a constant knocking coming from the door. She knew it hadn't just started, but she didn't realize she was hearing it. She quickly got up and jogged for the door unsure of how long she had left the knocker out there for.
"I thought you died or something," Xander greeted as he walked in.
"Sorry, I just fell asleep on the couch."
"Steamy dream?" he asked jokingly. She smiled awkwardly but he walked past her and put a big bag with various supplies down on the counter. Going with the gut instinct to never let a dream like that go unanswered, on top of the fact that Xander looked completely exhausted she decided to strike up a sensitive conversation.
"So… what's with the long face?"
"I don't know," he answered, "just tired I guess."
"You sure that's all? You've been kind of out of it lately…"
"I don't think I really need to explain why," he answered, knowing it was more obvious than he really wanted it to be.
"You don't need to, but I thought maybe you'd want to."
"You're really just dying for dirt on Faith, aren't you?" he asked, suddenly getting very annoyed.
"I didn't say that," she answered justly – it wasn't like she had really even gotten to the sensitive part… yet. "But if that's where you want to go with this, okay. Why are you so stuck on her? I mean, I just don't get it with you guys… I mean I know the whole damsel in distress things gets guys, but Faith just takes it to a whole different plane!"
"Don't-"
"I mean, really… Angel's got it too – pouting lips, heaving bosom… the crying… it really does the trick. I mean, leave it to Faith to come up with the perfect formula for that – gotta give credit where credit is due, I guess, the girls got the entire male race figured out!"
"You are so jealous of her."
"What!?"
"You are," he answered, "sure, it's a close race between you two when it comes to Slaying, but there are certain things where Faith is just so much better that it kills you."
"Name one."
"Guys, sex… however you want to put it," he answered quickly as though to just name one of the many. "It kills you that she's got that part of her that's so out of your league."
"Yeah, because it's sleazy!"
"No, because you could never even compare to her when it comes to that and it really bothers you. It's something that she doesn't need to be a slayer to have and she does, and you can't even touch it."
"Listen to you. How do you even know what I'm like in bed?" she asked realizing he had no way of comparison.
"I don't need to… I can just look at how you act when the subject comes up with Faith in it."
"Okay, the girl can fuck you better than any hooker ever could, is that your point, Xander? Sorry, but I like to know the guys name first… not to mention that I can actually look at a guy when I'm sleeping with him. She likes pain – like I said, she can fuck the hell out of you, but-"
"That's not what's great about it," he stated firmly, "she can be gentler than anyone I've ever met. She can be so soft and sensitive when she kisses you… you never thought it was possible to have someone feel that way. It's nicer than anyone else could ever be… and it only makes it more amazing when you know just how nasty and rough she can be."
"Okay," Buffy answered trying to cover up the emotions that just hit her since deep down inside, hidden within her, she *did* know what it felt like when Faith kissed you so softly. She had to defend against something that had amazed her so much so long ago. "So she can play the fucking part, big deal. Like with everything else with her, it's fake. She knows you want a gentle girl, she'll give you a gentle girl. Faith's got the whole bordello wrapped into one… sure, I guess that's any guys dream girl," she quipped sarcastically.
"That's not the part that's fake," he explained firmly. "The tough, 'I don't need anybody' front that she puts on, that's the fake one."
"Does it really matter which one is fake? She's deceptive and-"
"How about, she's scared to let anybody in because she's never known anyone who didn't hurt her?" he asked angrily. "You have no idea what she's been through!"
"Oh, but you do… I'm sure, Xander. I'm sure your perfect little princess told you everything, exactly the way you wanted to hear it. Trigger off just the right emotions and-"
"I can't believe you!" he yelled in disbelief. "You have absolutely no idea…"
"Fill me in then Xander – who knows, maybe I've heard my own little personal version of everything you've been told."
"Somehow I doubt it," he answered angrily. "I'm not going to repeat what she said to me. What was said was said in confidence and-"
"She plays the same shit with Angel."
"Why do I doubt that her crying to me about how she walked into her mothers room to find her lying in a pool of her own blood after killing herself was her playing? Why don't I think that her waking up screaming almost every night because she had a dream about being raped was her playing? Huh, Buffy? But I guess you're right, that was all just her planning everything out so that I'd fall completely in love with her and-"
"You actually loved her?" Xander clenched his teeth together quickly unsure of how to answer.
"I don't know."
"How do you not know? You either loved her or you didn't."
"I care about her and I understand why she acts the way she does… that doesn't necessarily make it okay or right, but it makes it understandable, and in many cases honorable. The odds were against her from the beginning and she still turned out to be a beautiful, personable, and capable. She's been through-"
"So much, I know," Buffy interjected. Xander couldn't help but laugh at her unbelievable ignorance to such a blatant case.
"Buffy, have you ever been ignored in bed?"
"What?" she asked. He realized the question was slightly odd so he re-phrased,
"Have you ever been with someone who doesn't care what you want in bed?"
"No, but that's probably because I don't sleep with freaks."
"Spike aside, right?" he asked quickly. The tone in the room was strange – it would be immediately suspected to be hostile and tense, but – not to claim that it was entirely void of such emotions – there was a weird amount of amiability in the conversation. Quips were taken as they should, as quips. Both defended their side of the argument devotedly but emotions were kept calmed. It was a type of conversation they had never had with each other before – for that matter, it was a conversation that none of the Scoobies had ever really had with each other. Conversations on Faith were usually avoided like the plague as was anything to do with Buffy's love life and more so, Buffy's love life compared to Faith's. Strange it was, without a doubt.
"Can you do me a favor, Buffy… just picture yourself in this situation… just for a second."
"I'll ignore the fact that this is something you do in second grade."
"Sometimes we need to digress in order to understand things more maturely," he stated as though he had read it out of a psychology textbook. Buffy knew for a fact Xander hadn't ever seen, not to mention touched a psych textbook.
"Fine."
"Picture yourself completely alone – I mean, without anyone to turn to or-"
"Got it, not that far of a stretch for me."
"Okay," he accepted, "you're with this guy because you're lonely and really it's the only way you can see to have someone around you that at least feels like they're there for you and care about you…"
"Once again, not a stretch," she admitted.
"Okay, good, you can really do this then," he encouraged. "Now as a slight background note, you were raped by your mothers boyfriend the day you walked in to find her dead body. You can understand the trauma of walking in to find your mom…" he acknowledged, "but think of it a little worse because she killed herself and is still lying in a pool of blood."
"Okay," Buffy answered, her tone becoming more and more serious each time.
"You've done things with this guy before, but you haven't slept with him, or anyone for that matter except for when you were raped." Now Buffy's acknowledgement was a silence nod and Xander continued. "You're about to have sex with him and you're trying really hard to not think about what happened before because you don't want to freak out and have sex be an issue for you the rest of your life… but you don't want to tell this guy what happened to you because you know he wouldn't understand and probably wouldn't really care."
"Nice," she muttered sadly.
"Before you start you ask him to go slow, hoping maybe he'll pick up that you're a little nervous and the response you get is, 'you're giving *me* advice on how to do this?' Followed by an obnoxious, 'God, there's nothing more fucking annoying than a chick who can't keep her mouth shut.' You'd think the mood would be killed right there, but he didn't seem to think so… he does his thing and expects you to be happy with it. So, Buffy, how do you feel?"
"Someone did that to her?" He shrugged and answered,
"Probably made the whole thing up, right Buffy?" he asked cynically, "she probably had it all laid out to hit just the right emotions too…" he continued, "you know, like when we'd be together and I'd ask her if she was okay, or if it was okay and she'd glue her eyes either down at the floor or over at the wall and not answer… all part of her wicked little plan, right?"
"I…" Buffy tried to force out some form of a response but could hardly muster a syllable.
"You have no idea how long it took for her to be able to look at me… or talk to me… or the winner, believe me when I told her I loved her. She always thought I was just full of shit and that it was just a reflex for a guy to say that when he was getting some from a girl."
"Did you?"
"Huh?'
"Did you love her? You said she didn't believe you… should she have? Did you really mean what you said to her?"
"I don't want to-"
"No, now I want to know," she demanded.
"Yes. I loved her… I still love her," he admitted as though it was a thought he was allowing himself to admit to himself for the first time.
"Then why did you break up with her?"
"Because I loved her so much…" he explained, "I couldn't stand the thought of having someone or something take her away from me so I pushed her away myself. It doesn't really make sense when you say it."
"Actually, that's not too far of a stretch for me to understand either."
-----------
Faith woke up letting out a painful scream. She tried to calm herself down but it took several minutes to regulate her breathing. She held her head in her hands trying to stop the flashing pictures that played on a constant reel on the back of her eyelids. She slowly sank back down on the bed resting her hand over her face letting herself imagine it was his calming hand wiping away her tears instead of her own. She stared blankly across the room rubbing her thumb softly across her cheek in a slow and soft rhythm trying to calm her senses as he did so many times.
*'I love you… and you love me-'
'No, I don't.'*
She didn't even know how to make herself stop crying anymore. Pictures flashing through her head of him making love to her and how it felt and everything about it should have made her feel better, made her feel needed, but now they just made her feel worse. She knew what she had lost and she wanted it back. She knew she needed to get over it but she wasn't sure she could. She was never going to even meet another guy like him, let alone have him as hers. Xander knew everything about her – things she wished he didn't, even – but he knew it and he understood where she was coming from when she did things. He understood… she could be in a really rank mood and he'd get why, or she could be really quiet and he'd understand, or she could be obnoxious and loud and he'd know… no matter what mood or act or front she through at him he took it, understood it, and worked with it.
Thinking about all the garbage he dealt with from her she understood why he wouldn't want her anymore. She knew she could never be with anyone like her – but that's what made him so fantastic, it was the fact that he knew her and still wanted her. She didn't have to hide anything… she didn't have to act any part for him… he knew her and he actually liked it. That was something she would never understand. Why would anyone want her? She couldn't blame him for what he did… if she were in his shoes she probably would've dumped her too. The idea brought back the feeling she got in the pit of her stomach when he broke it off with her. It made her both laugh and cry – the pain was so much but she wouldn't let herself feel sorry for herself. This wasn't her style – but then again, dating never was her style either. If someone had told her a few years ago that she was going to end up going steady with some guy, falling completely in love with him, and then having him dump her, not only would she not have believed them but they probably would've gotten an ass kicking too.
But there was one thing she couldn't stop herself from thinking about – just what it felt like when he made love to her. She could admit it; he was probably the one and only guy to make love to her rather than just screw, fuck, whatever you want to call it. There was a big difference between them… she couldn't get it out of her head the way it felt with him. She had been his first and even then, not to say it lasted all that long or to say that he had any clue – but it always had a really intimate feel. He liked to hold her and touch her and look at her. It was always a little bit more about her than it was about him and that was a rare thing to come by with a guy. She could practically feel his hands on her arms and neck – that was how vivid the memory was. She could feel his lips grazing softly over her skin and the way he felt and smelled and tasted on top of her.
She stood up off of the bed beads of sweat practically forming on her forehead thinking about him. She was going out. He had to get out of her head right now and she knew exactly how to do it – she had to go out.
------------
Xander left Buffy's house and headed back for the main headquarters as their conversation came to a closing. It was such a bazaar conversation that he felt like he couldn't even thinking about it anymore. He loved her… he wanted her back. Now rephrase – he needed her back. He had been on the borderline between running to go get her back and dealing with the pain, convinced it would surely fade and go away because it had been such a short-term thing. He forced himself to stop thinking about it to avoid doing something irrational. He walked into the house holding a few boxes of pizza and put them down on the counter.
The food was well received by all and within about thirty seconds the kitchen was filled with everyone. Kennedy and Willow were the last to come in. Kennedy looked a little off… she seemed angry and disappointed mixed with her usual weird mood since Faith had left. Kennedy had taken it almost as hard as he had. She lost someone she looked up to and depended on. Faith was important to her… and she just left. Kennedy would never be able to realize how much it hurt Faith to have to leave her too.
"So, how was everybody's day?" Xander asked grabbing a slice of pizza of out of the box.
"Boring," Andrew answered.
"I was working on that bookshelf," Wood began, "I could use some help with the electrical slot we wanted to put in it," he admitted. Xander nodded,
"Yeah, no problem. He looked over at Willow to see how her day was going, "how're the files going?"
"Umm… Xander, Faith called today," she spat out. The room went instantly silent as everyone hung on what she was saying.
"Is everything okay? Is she okay?" he asked a little too quickly to pass it off as normal concern. "What's wrong?"
"She actually called just wondering if you got the job with the construction company."
"Yeah…" he muttered. "She was pretty excited when I mentioned it to her…"
"She was really happy for you," Willow added.
"What else did she say?" he asked eagerly.
"She really didn't say anything else… she was disappointed you weren't home, but she was thrilled that you got the job," Willow assured him. He could tell by the tone of her voice that something was wrong.
"Willow, what's wrong?"
"I'm not going to lie, Xander, and we all know I'm not exactly president of Faith's fan club, never was never will be, but… she doesn't sound good. I was a little worried about her after talking to her on the phone for all of five minutes. She doesn't sound like she's doing so good."
-----------
Angel walked quickly down the corridor towards Faith's quarters in the Wolfram & Hart building. As he turned a sharp bend around the corner he ran right into Faith.
"Whoa, sorry," she said quickly, startled by the collision.
"It's alright. Are you okay?" he asked quickly, figuring she was coming to get him for something. Upon a second look at her it was fairly obvious that she was headed out.
"I'm five by five. Where you rushing to?"
"Coming to check on you, actually."
"I'm going out," she stated firmly.
"I don't really think that's a great idea right now. You're not feeling your best and there's going to vamps crawling the streets… I don't want you to get hurt."
"I'm going off duty tonight. No vamps for me… just a little liquor and a hottie and I'll be set to go," she added trying to walk around him.
"Faith, don't deal with it this way," he said almost begging.
"As Xander would say, this is me *not* dealing… it's not a situation needing dealing, it's one that needs forgetting. And like I said, liquor and a hottie and it'll be history…"
"I really don't want you to go."
"Then I guess it's a good thing it's not up to you, huh?" she asked sharply. She walked around him and headed out of the building.
---------
"Where are you going?" Giles asked seeing Xander heading for the garage door with a small duffle bag and a coat.
"L.A."
"Why?"
"I need to go make sure she's okay."
"You could probably call… it's a lot easier and it takes about four less hours."
"Not the way I drive."
"Xander…"
"Giles, I need her," he admitted. "I can't deal with this anymore so I'm going to get her."
A shiver went through Wesley as he stood in the shadowed corner of the sidewalk at the entrance to the underground parking lot of Wolfram & Hart anxiously awaiting Angel's return. His anxiety is what led him to stand out in the bitter cold with biting wind whistling past him without a single regard to him. He didn't want to even waist the time of Angel walking inside before he got to speak with him. A strange mixture of relief and disquiet filled the inside of his chest as Angel finally drove into the parking lot in his favorite company car, the Viper. Wesley quickly walked over to the stopped car now in it's designated parking spot. Angel quickly got out of the car having noticed Wesley waiting for him.
"What's wrong?" Wesley took a deep breath after glancing into the vehicle hoping Angel had perhaps brought with him a certain passenger.
"Well," Wesley answered with a pause trying to find the best way of explanation.
"Let's walk as you talk," Angel abruptly ordered wanting to go see her. They entered the building and Angel maintained his quick pace seeing the Wesley's speed only encouraged him to go faster. "What's going on?" he asked only taking a breath once they were standing in the elevator.
"Well, this morning I went in to check on her since I hadn't seen her about and she wasn't in bed as I suspected and-"
"Wesley, a little less English and a little more point."
"She was very upset… inconsolable even… she seemed ill too. I want to know what the bloody hell is going on!" Wesley finally shouted losing his patience. Wesley's dramatic words were of high impact, but their effect was immediately forgotten with the opening of the door to Faith's quarters.
"Faith?" Angel called very softly. There was no response and Wesley led him over to the bathroom where the door was partially ajar. Angel looked in cautiously and his heart dropped as he saw her vomiting into the toilet. He stood there unsure of what to do before he felt Wesley push past him and walk into the bathroom. He walked over to the sink and wet a small towel and wrung it out.
"Have a few drinks last night?" Angel asked as she sat back down on the floor and leaned her back against the wall.
"No," she answered unsteadily. Angel looked over at Wesley doubting she was being truthful but Wesley confirmed her candor with a subtle shake of his head as he offered her the towel. She took it and pressed it against her forehead but immediately jerked back and Angel saw the reason for it was a cut running through her eyebrow and up her forehead.
As if she suddenly realized Angel was standing there she looked out of the bathroom behind Angel as if looking for someone.
"He didn't come, did he?" she asked shakily.
"No, why would he?" Angel tone was a little uncharacteristic due to him still being angry with Xander and the entire situation. He almost felt angry at Faith for feeling so strongly about Xander.
"Never mind," she answered spitefully. Even now she still held onto a thin thread of hope that maybe Xander would come walking through the door, kneel down next to her and hold her tightly telling her that all the pain was going to go away again and it would be just like it was.
"What's wrong?" Angel asked trying to make his tone softer and more consoling.
"Nothing… I'm fine."
"Wesley, could you…" Angel asked motioning for him to leave. To his surprise, the response he received was against his request and in a strong way. Angel motioned to talk with him outside of the bathroom and both of them exited.
"Why should I leave?" Wesley asked angrily.
"Wesley…"
"You left me with her and now you want to come back with an attitude and you not only expect her to talk to you but you want me to leave her to you?"
"Wesley…"
"I just can't believe you!" he stated outraged. "Did it occur to you that maybe the only thing she's been hoping for since you left was that you'd return with him?"
"He doesn't deserve-"
"You don't deserve to make that judgment. Granted I don't know everything going on here, but I've figured out the main gist and-"
"I'm sorry… I'm just… I'm angry. I'm a little on edge right now and-"
"Don't take it out on her. You're not with them anymore, you're here with her and you have to stop talking like-"
"I'm sorry. I-" he stopped hearing coughing coming from the bathroom. "I need to talk to her alone… she doesn't like to look weak in front of you." Without a response Wesley left the apartment glancing quickly in the bathroom trying to sooth his nerves. Angel walked back over to the doorway to the bathroom. He looked over at her and it felt like the sun was melting him from the inside outward. Between the cut on her face and the thick layer of sweat covering her face, neck and arms he felt sick.
"When did you get sick?"
"I woke up this way."
"Why?"
"Does it matter?"
"What's the cut from?"
"We playing twenty questions?"
"No, I was just wondering why your face is bleeding, that's all."
"Making you hungry?" she asked looking up at him angrily.
"What's the matter with you?" he asked losing his composure at the fact that she was acting like he had done something terrible to her since he walked into the room.
"Sorry, I'm in kind of a bad mood… I've been here puking with a pounding headache wondering whether you went to Slayer H.Q.'s to shack up with Buffy or to give Xander a time out… or maybe it's just cause I've got a bad attitude." She tossed the towel Wesley had given her onto the floor and slowly got to her feet – very slowly.
"You're in pretty bad shape," Angel mentioned just trying to find something that would help him break through to her right now. She was on high defense, as usual, but right now she was in pain too, and if he wasn't on edge already, having to see her like this was certainly not helping.
"You always were the sharp one," she muttered sardonically as she walked past him out of the bathroom and into the bedroom of the quite spacious, Wolfram & Hart apartment. He followed her quietly, making himself not snap back at her comments. This was the way she was – especially at times like this.
Why was it that when he really needed to be able to deal with her that he was finding it so difficult? He knew what it was though – he was frustrated. He had gone to Buffy's not expecting anything but to be able to find some magical solution. Seeing the pain she was in made him irrational and knowing that he couldn't just fix it for her frustrated it for him. And ironically, he took that anger out on her.
"So what happened to your forehead?" he pressed. He pushed on the one question knowing if he couldn't get her to answer a simple question like this he wasn't going to get anywhere.
"It's an interesting story actually – it instigated a fight with the door knob…" she paused for dramatic effect and Angel hung on her last word waiting for her to continue. "Actually, it's not that interesting," she admitted with a shrug. She walked over to the window and picked up a glass of water she had left on the sill.
"So what happened?" he asked again.
"Oh… the door knob won," she answered bluntly. Angel was sure to make sure she couldn't hear the deep breath he needed to take.
"What's with your foreheads sudden violence?"
"No," she answered finally with a slow shake of her head, "I told you, I woke up feeling like ass and I went into the bathroom there and I sat down and I hit my head."
"Looks like you sat down pretty hard," he commented looking at the pretty deep gash on her forehead. "You sure you didn't fall?"
"We gonna argue semantics now? Sitting is a controlled fall, isn't it?"
"Okay," he agreed, "but that doesn't look too controlled."
"I don't know," she finally admitted, "I kind of blacked out for a second… we'll say it started out as a 'controlled fall' and whether it ended as one or not is up to interpretation…" He watched her carefully as she sipped carefully at the water as though if it might shatter in her mouth. After a few very small sips which barely changed the level of the liquid in the glass she placed it down on the floor near the bed and trying not to seem like she really needed to sit down she did so very slowly. Her eyes were extremely bloodshot and had heavy, dark bags under them only further accentuated by the paleness of her face.
"You blacked out? What's wrong with you… you really don't look good."
"You know just how to make a girl feel special, don't you? I can see why B had such a thing for you," she commented sarcastically.
"I mean it – why are you sick? Slayer's aren't really supposed to get sick like this."
"You remember that promise you made me?" she asked. He felt like he was being thrown a curve ball and stood there scanning his brain for possible answers. "You said that there was one thing you could promise me, and that was that what I had done would haunt me, probably for the rest of my life…"
"Yeah," he nodded understandingly.
"Well, let's just say I wish you were just another shmuck who didn't keep your promises."
"But I don't understand – why are you-"
"Sometimes it's really bad… I'll see flashes of everything that I've done or been through… everything… it just flashes through my head at a million miles an hour but I can see everything so clear and even more than that, I feel everything hit me that I felt. All of the emotions and pain and… everything, it just all hit me and it's enough of a rollercoaster to literally make me sick. I feel everything – I see everyone and what I did… I see the blood on my hands and I feel the fluster in my stomach and I really can't handle it anymore…" she babbled painfully.
"So this is about that, not Xander?"
"I don't know," she admitted, "when I was with him I'd wake up like I did this morning and, I don't know what he did, but he would just… he would just hold me… he would hold me and talk to me and everything would just slow down… and then I could handle it and sometimes it would even go away… Angel, I can't handle it anymore," she admitted, "with him I was able to deal with all this shit going on in my head, but I really don't know if I can by myself… I want to be done." She stood up off of the bed and walked over to a table across the room with her jacket strewn on top of it. She rummaged through the pockets and pulled out her pack of cigarettes. She opened the pack and began to remove a cigarette but then feeling the queasiness in her stomach placed it back on the table still holding the lighter in her hand out of habit.
"Faith, you got on this rollercoaster the day you walked into the Mayor's office… you can't just decide the rides over now," he answered trying to not sound harsh but needing to maintain the same degree of firmness needed to make sure she realized still what she did was wrong. "You had an awesome time on the first half of the ride…"
"Second half, not so much," she added spitefully. "But you know… it's like at the carnival, you're on the huge ride and if you scream loud enough sometimes they'll stop it for you so you can get off, and Angel, I'm screaming as loud as I can!"
"Faith you've got people around you who are listening. You can't forget that…"
"I know you're listening, but I just don't think anyone can actual hear it…"
"Faith, I-"
"Whatever," she said tiredly cutting him off. She wasn't trying to keep him from speaking but she just couldn't listen to anymore or think about anything with her head spinning around so quickly. It began to speed up again since she was starting to think about her emotions and that was what fueled everything inside of her head…
"No, it's not whatever!" Angel began reprimanding.
*'I can't handle it without you… I just can't. Baby, don't leave… I'll do anything, I need you… you don't know how much it hurts… I can't do it without you, baby, please don't leave me…'*
"Angel," she called almost in a panic as she lost feeling in her legs and the room began to spin around her so quickly it felt slow. She grabbed for the table behind her but she barely felt her hand touch it before she blacked out. Angel rushed over to her practically being able to see her consciousness pulled away from her in a whirlwind of force. He caught her limp body just as her legs were on the floor, able to catch her upper body before it struck the ground.
Almost in a panic he looked frantically around the room for something cold but all he could see was the water across the room by the bed. He then began to blow on her face hoping it would help bring her back – after a few breaths he realized he didn't have any breath…
"Problem," he announced. On the brink of ultimate panic he felt her breathe in a deep gasp of air and grab his arm in her tight grasp. "Faith… oh my god… I'm making a rule – that's not allowed…" he said with as much levity as he could muster. All quickly disappeared when he looked down at her and saw her begin to cry.
"I just want to be done, Angel. Why can't I be done? It just hurts too much…" Angel had a painful recollection of Darla for reasons he both understood and didn't. Everything was very much the same but at the same time very different. He loved her and he could openly admit to almost anyone that that was the true state of his feelings – but it wasn't that type of love. He deeply cared about her and for her, but it was in no way a sexually based attraction. There was something very sensual about their relationship but he in no way felt a sexual tension between himself and her. He was aware that at one point that was very much all she was interested in when it came to him but he was also very much aware that there was a lot more going on with her then with plenty of ulterior motives floating around. She was going through a lot of the same things that Darla had been going through when she got her soul returned to her by Wolfram& Hart. Begrudgingly he had to recognize the building he was presently standing in.
"Faith, why don't you lie down for a little while," he suggested beginning to help her stand.
"No," she protested shaking her head, "I don't want to go to sleep…"
"Well… you should rest. I want to go to Wesley and do a little research – I want to make sure this isn't some demon manipulating this situation and making you think that all of this is about Xander when it's really doing something to you-"
"Angel, this isn't new."
"Faith, that wasn't normal… heartbreak, yeah… hangover, sure… passing out for no reason, not buying it…"
"Whatever," she answered pushing away his helping hand. She stood up charily then slowly walked over to the glass of water. Knowing he probably shouldn't leave but also being aware that his fragile nerves right now were getting him nowhere with her he turned and exited the room wanting to be back as soon as possible but also needing to take a breath of fresh air outside of her room. She heard the clicking of the door behind her and she shoved the glass of water onto the floor from its resting position on the sill. She wiped a stray tear from her face angrily – she felt helpless, weak, and useless!
He was finally back but he wasn't really… He felt like he was just as far away as he was when he was gone. What happened while he was gone? Why was he being so weird? All of these questions dragged around in her head but even with them occupying her she couldn't help but allow others to fog her mind as well. What did Xander say? How did he feel? Did he even care how she felt?
------------
"Hungry?" Willow asked as she walked into Faith's old bedroom. It had become clear that Xander wasn't going to stay anywhere else. She walked in and saw him sitting there in a room lighted only by the moon outside the window and a few stray street lamps. He was sitting on the unkempt bed and appeared as though looking up at her was the first time he had looked up from the floor since he came in here hours earlier.
Willow had become especially concerned once Angel had left – seeing Xander around the house had become a rare if ever occurrence. She was worried… she had known Xander forever and she was used to him dealing with his problems alone, but it made her uncomfortable to see him literally disappear. She hated to even allow the thought to enter her mind, but she had to realize that since Faith had left it had gone completely down hill. She soothed this thought slightly by analyzing that if she had never come back at all it would've been even better…
"No, I've got to get ready for work."
"Don't you need to eat before you go to work?" she asked with a comforting smile.
"They give me this strange thing now… it's… oh, what's it called… right, lunch breaks," he stated sardonically. Both of them couldn't deny how Faith-like what he said was but Willow tried to push past that.
"Breakfast is more what I had in mind," she added motioning towards the digital clock which Xander had replaced on the table beside the bed. He glanced towards the clock and saw the glowing 5:47a.m. He nodded knowing to himself that he hadn't slept all night and had been staring at that face of the clock sporadically since around midnight. When he wasn't looking at the neon green glowing digits he was either looking down at the dark floor or at the pictures he still was holding in his hands.
"Umm… I'm not really hungry, Will, thanks though…"
"Is everything okay?" she asked cautiously.
"Yeah," he answered a little too quickly. He fidgeted nervously on the bed for a moment realizing how quickly he had answered.
"You can talk to me you know…"
"I don't really want to talk about-" he stopped himself as quickly as he could which was still way too late. "I know… thank you."
"Xander, you're-"
"I'm fine," he stated just as quickly but much more firmly.
---------------------
"Wesley," Angel called as he walked up to his office. Wesley looked up from his desk to see Angel walking in anxiously.
"What is it?"
"It's… Wesley, I thought I had most of this whole thing figured out but now I'm not so sure anymore."
"Why the sudden change of heart?" he asked still not completely sure what he was getting at. He felt a little in the dark on the whole situation but whenever things came to Faith he had become somewhat used to being in the dark.
"Wesley, I don't know – I thought I understood, but I don't think what I think it is could bring everything to such an extreme… like it was… I mean, yeah, really upset and even depressed, but not passing out and being ill… I don't think… right?"
"I pride myself in being able to decrypt a third of what you just said. Perhaps you could explain to me exactly what you thought you understood…"
"Okay… I mean, I understood why, well I thought I did, about Faith. About why this whole thing with Xander bothered her so much. I mean, just think about it – her entire life she's heard nothing but people telling her that she's completely useless, worthless, and replaceable. I mean everyone from her mother to any authority figures she had to…" he trailed off looking back up at Wesley knowing he wanted to say him. "Wesley, that's all she heard growing up… I mean, that wasn't the only thing she had to deal with but I really believe that's the root of everything deep down inside of her. I mean, it made sense – it explained a lot of her behaviors. She acts like she doesn't care what anyone thinks about her but really, she does.
"When it comes to sleeping around with guys she doesn't know… that makes sense too because as much as she doesn't show it, even if it's just some guy who she knows is lying, they act like they care about her, they tell her they need her, treat her kind of special… she goes for it. She absolutely craves feeling that way! And with Xander, right from the beginning she had that… Xander's a nice guy, probably something she hadn't dealt with a lot before meeting him. He went to her when she needed help – granted she didn't know how to handle it at the time – she still knew that it made her feel good.
"When they were together he was the first person to really make her feel wanted – he was the first person to tell her all of those things she had never heard before and really mean it. I mean, Wesley, to finally have someone who absolutely accepted her – and I mean everything about her. He… he made her feel loved, Wesley! She's *never* felt that before… then he tells her it wasn't true. He tells her that what he said, the only person who's ever said it and made her feel like he actually meant it, he didn't and that it was all just a lie.
"How could she think anything but that what she's been told her whole life is true? So I can see her upset… I can see her being depressed – very much so actually, especially when all of this is on top of everything she's going through. But Wesley, is it enough to make her physically sick like she is right now?"
"The mind is a very powerful thing… Angel, it's important to remember that no matter how well she's doing, how good she seems, Faith is a very sick girl. She's sick, Angel… very sick."
"Tell me she's sick one more time Wesley and you're going to see that by comparison," he spat defensively.
"More credit to her, Angel," he continued remaining composed throughout the entire conversation, "she's dealt with so much for a girl her age – it's extraordinary… but… Angel, we must all understand that-"
"Wesley, why is she passing out and throwing up?"
"She passed out?" he asked, his level of concern rising even higher.
"What's going on, Wesley, I need to know."
"Well, we've all seen what Faith's mind has led her to do to others in the past… how far it took her to the other side and how long she stayed there. It was all about the mind games she plays being played on herself. Only then she took it out on others… now she's taking it out on herself. I think we're both aware of the damage she can do… just imagine that exponentially since it doesn't need to be physically materialized, it only needs to remain in her head."
------------
Willow sat on the couch in the living room with stacks of papers sprawled about the table in front of her as well as on the floor and on her lap, not to mention all over the couch. They had begun to seriously network as well as they could and try and figure out which girls had been given Slayer powers seeming as how they're fix for the first could probably develop into something much worse. She was driven by the thought of a billion Faith's… not a good world. She had print outs of suspicious imprisonments of minors, school uprisings, etc. It was a lot of things to sift through and hard to determine which had to do with Slayers and which had to do with rowdy teenagers.
The phone rang just as she picked up a file. She placed it back down and answered the phone.
"Hello?"
"Hi… Willow, it's Faith." Willow hesitated answering for a longer moment than she realized. Faith was the last person she thought would be on the other end of the phone call and she didn't sound too great. She sounded tired and her voice was raspy and more tired sounding then usual. It was enough for her to notice that there was a fairly drastic change. "Sorry, umm… I…"
"No, it's fine," Willow interjected. She hadn't realized how long that uncomfortable pause had been. "How are you?"
"You know me," she answered typically.
"Right… you sound a little-"
"Is Xander there?" she asked as though she had to spit it out or she was never going to be able to ask. The tone of her voice was enough to even make Willow feel terrible that he actually wasn't.
"No, I'm really sorry… he's not here, but if you want me to tell him you called…"
"No, it's okay," she answered, her tone trying to cover up her disappointment. Willow could hear her exhaling, signally to her that she must be smoking. "I just called to find out if he got that job… you know the one he went to the interview when I left…"
"Yeah," Willow answered, happier that she could help with something positive. "He's actually there now, that's why he's not home."
"That's so good," she answered as though she were thinking out loud.
"Do you want me to give him a message?" Willow offered again.
"No, it's okay… I was really just wondering if he got that job or not," she explained. "Thanks, Willow… I've got to go, so I'll talk to you later."
"Okay… take care of yourself, Faith…" Willow answered but she was fairly sure she wasn't heard when the click from Faith hanging up interrupted the phrase. She hung up the phone and picked up the file again but remained staring at the manila folder for several minutes unable to think of anything except Faith and Xander. She didn't dare to claim that she knew Faith – the girl never ceased to confused the shit out of her. But she definitely had just called to ask if the guy who broke her heart had gotten the job he was trying for the day she moved out… the little that she knew about Faith, that wasn't typical and it meant she wasn't lying when she said it had been on her mind. She could picture Faith pacing back and forth for hours before letting herself pick up that phone to call. Before she had picked up that phone if anyone asked her what she thought about Faith and Xander she would've said she was happy that Xander had ended things before he got hurt, but hearing the tone of Faith's voice when she had to tell her that he wasn't there was enough to make her rethink her answer.
There was a lot of pain in her tone… more so than usual. She wasn't president of Faith's fan club but she could admit the chick had been through a lot. Just listening to the tone of her voice on the phone had been enough to make her temporarily forget about Xander, and how she had been relieved that he was going to be out of harms way, and she became concerned with Faith and was able to see how downhill she had gone. Noticing that made it impossible for her to ignore the fact that Xander had also gone downhill, perhaps even on just as steep a slope. She knew Faith must be in a pretty bad way to be calling like that and admitting that she called to talk to him and just ask him about a job – she hadn't even put on a front and tried to act tough and indifferent. She called sounding tired, upset, and even desperate.
Kennedy walked down from upstairs and walked into the living room. She saw Willow staring blankly at the open file and she asked with concern,
"Is everything alright?" Willow snapped out of her temporary daze,
"Yes, I'm fine. I just kind of blanked out…" Kennedy sat down on the couch next to her in a spot that was free of papers.
"Who was that on the phone, I heard it ring…"
"Faith, actually." Kennedy was just as surprised as Willow had been. It was obvious to her lover from her expression that she was extremely curious and overwhelmed with various emotions now.
----------------
"Bye, Xander," several coworkers called as they walked off the site. Xander waved goodbye to all of his new pals and began to gather up his things ready to head out. He was going to stop by Buffy and Dawn's house to check in on the hot water heater – he had been suspicious about it's reliability from the beginning – and now Buffy and been complaining that the water wasn't getting more than lukewarm.
"Harris!" his boss called unexpectedly.
"Sir, how are you?" he greeted respectfully. He wiped his hand off in his shirt before offering a handshake.
"Harris, I have a question for you."
"Yes sir."
"How would you like to head a new project we have over in the downtown area?"
"Head it?"
"Yes, I want to put you in charge of the project. You seem plenty qualified from what I've seen. Are you up for it? But before you answer that, Harris, let me tell you – unless that girl of yours is back and occupying all of your free time I wouldn't pass this one up," he joked.
"I'm on it, Sir."
"Good man, Harris. Congratulations; I'll see you tomorrow to go over the prints."
"Yes sir."
----------------
Faith had called Slayer HQ's while lying on her bed trying to steady her pounding head and spinning stomach. After hanging up the phone with Willow she had hardly moved except to put out her cigarette and to wipe her eyes from all of her, umm… allergies. She hadn't slept in days and the slight tears and exhaustion was enough to ease her into a slight nap. Even as she fell asleep she was still chiding herself for allowing herself to have anything she wanted anymore – even when it was just sleep – because she knew she just shouldn't. She didn't want to see anymore faces… she didn't want to feel anymore emotions… memories for her were horrible and something she wished she could avoid. While awake she could usually control them enough to keep them out of her head but while she was asleep there was no limit to how graphic or haunting they could be.
------dream------
She walked into a bar and took a seat on a stool that seemed somehow familiar. A figure walked over to her that revealed itself as Lorne.
'I'm usually the one on the receiving end, gorgeous, but what'll you have?'
'Don't worry, I'm usually not getting shit I'm just doing all the leg work, so we're both on unsteady ground…' she explained, 'let me start out with a Jack and Coke…' Lorne quickly produced one with a wave of his hand and placed it down in front of her. A hand quickly appeared next to her placing money down on the bar,
'It's on me,' Buffy's voice revealed. Faith turned and looked at her strangely. Lorne took the money off of the bar and disappeared behind the shadowed bar.
'Since when are you buying me drinks?'
'Seemed like the least I could do…'
'Whatever.'
'What's going on with you?'
'Got a lot going on in my head…'
'What, you mean like me popping in for random visit in it?' she asked with a laugh.
'You've got the whole, still being alive thing going for you, don't worry,' she answered with an equal amount of levity.
'Can I ask you a question?' she asked. She took her silence as admission and continued, 'what happened to the whole get over it attitude you usually have?'
'I knew it could feel like this so I never let it… but everything happened and I just needed it so bad… and I couldn't lie about it anymore – it felt so good to have someone who loved me that losing that… I mean, I don't know…'
'It's so confusing. You know how I love riddles, right?'
'Yeah – the best one though is, 'is it better to have loved and lost…' '
'or 'to have never loved at all' ' she chimed in.
'I don't know!' she answered angrily as though being pushed for an answer.
'It hurts so much… I can't breathe.'
'It never goes away, does it?'
'Watch out!' she yelled. Faith jumped up out of her stool and in front of a huge wolf jumping towards Buffy. She blocked it from getting to Buffy and struggled with it to keep it's wildly snapping jaws from contacting with her face. She could feel every ounce of her strength slowly tiring as she struggled to gain an inch with the wild beast. She just couldn't let it win – but she couldn't keep it down.
'Buffy, help me!' she cried out desperately as she felt it slowly gaining ground on her. Buffy's face flashed quickly past her then she was gone. She lost her focus as her eyes followed Buffy's disappearing face and she quickly felt her mistake as the wolf leaped up again, knocking her down onto her back. She held her hands up above her face to try and grab hold of it's scruff again to maintain it's distance away from her but it attacked mercilessly, sinking it's teeth into her hands and wrists before making it to it's real goal by her face and neck. She didn't scream… she didn't scream at all… the pain was there, she felt it, but it didn't matter. It's what she almost liked about pain – it made you forget about all of the other shit going on and it made you just focus on one thing. She left… they all just left… they said they wouldn't but in the end that's what they do. She was alone and it was because they left her.
------dream over--------
Buffy woke up with a jerk – sitting up quickly, rubbing her eyes to wipe away the fog. She'd had bazaar dreams before, it kind of came with the Slayer territory, but this one won the prize. First Faith buys her a drink in a bar, then she gets her to talk about Angel, while Faith's quoting Shakespeare!? If she were in charge of writing her dreams, she joked in her head, Faith definitely would've said something more along the lines of, damn this shit sucks.
Either way the dream was really weird. She sat there for another moment but then she finally realized there was a constant knocking coming from the door. She knew it hadn't just started, but she didn't realize she was hearing it. She quickly got up and jogged for the door unsure of how long she had left the knocker out there for.
"I thought you died or something," Xander greeted as he walked in.
"Sorry, I just fell asleep on the couch."
"Steamy dream?" he asked jokingly. She smiled awkwardly but he walked past her and put a big bag with various supplies down on the counter. Going with the gut instinct to never let a dream like that go unanswered, on top of the fact that Xander looked completely exhausted she decided to strike up a sensitive conversation.
"So… what's with the long face?"
"I don't know," he answered, "just tired I guess."
"You sure that's all? You've been kind of out of it lately…"
"I don't think I really need to explain why," he answered, knowing it was more obvious than he really wanted it to be.
"You don't need to, but I thought maybe you'd want to."
"You're really just dying for dirt on Faith, aren't you?" he asked, suddenly getting very annoyed.
"I didn't say that," she answered justly – it wasn't like she had really even gotten to the sensitive part… yet. "But if that's where you want to go with this, okay. Why are you so stuck on her? I mean, I just don't get it with you guys… I mean I know the whole damsel in distress things gets guys, but Faith just takes it to a whole different plane!"
"Don't-"
"I mean, really… Angel's got it too – pouting lips, heaving bosom… the crying… it really does the trick. I mean, leave it to Faith to come up with the perfect formula for that – gotta give credit where credit is due, I guess, the girls got the entire male race figured out!"
"You are so jealous of her."
"What!?"
"You are," he answered, "sure, it's a close race between you two when it comes to Slaying, but there are certain things where Faith is just so much better that it kills you."
"Name one."
"Guys, sex… however you want to put it," he answered quickly as though to just name one of the many. "It kills you that she's got that part of her that's so out of your league."
"Yeah, because it's sleazy!"
"No, because you could never even compare to her when it comes to that and it really bothers you. It's something that she doesn't need to be a slayer to have and she does, and you can't even touch it."
"Listen to you. How do you even know what I'm like in bed?" she asked realizing he had no way of comparison.
"I don't need to… I can just look at how you act when the subject comes up with Faith in it."
"Okay, the girl can fuck you better than any hooker ever could, is that your point, Xander? Sorry, but I like to know the guys name first… not to mention that I can actually look at a guy when I'm sleeping with him. She likes pain – like I said, she can fuck the hell out of you, but-"
"That's not what's great about it," he stated firmly, "she can be gentler than anyone I've ever met. She can be so soft and sensitive when she kisses you… you never thought it was possible to have someone feel that way. It's nicer than anyone else could ever be… and it only makes it more amazing when you know just how nasty and rough she can be."
"Okay," Buffy answered trying to cover up the emotions that just hit her since deep down inside, hidden within her, she *did* know what it felt like when Faith kissed you so softly. She had to defend against something that had amazed her so much so long ago. "So she can play the fucking part, big deal. Like with everything else with her, it's fake. She knows you want a gentle girl, she'll give you a gentle girl. Faith's got the whole bordello wrapped into one… sure, I guess that's any guys dream girl," she quipped sarcastically.
"That's not the part that's fake," he explained firmly. "The tough, 'I don't need anybody' front that she puts on, that's the fake one."
"Does it really matter which one is fake? She's deceptive and-"
"How about, she's scared to let anybody in because she's never known anyone who didn't hurt her?" he asked angrily. "You have no idea what she's been through!"
"Oh, but you do… I'm sure, Xander. I'm sure your perfect little princess told you everything, exactly the way you wanted to hear it. Trigger off just the right emotions and-"
"I can't believe you!" he yelled in disbelief. "You have absolutely no idea…"
"Fill me in then Xander – who knows, maybe I've heard my own little personal version of everything you've been told."
"Somehow I doubt it," he answered angrily. "I'm not going to repeat what she said to me. What was said was said in confidence and-"
"She plays the same shit with Angel."
"Why do I doubt that her crying to me about how she walked into her mothers room to find her lying in a pool of her own blood after killing herself was her playing? Why don't I think that her waking up screaming almost every night because she had a dream about being raped was her playing? Huh, Buffy? But I guess you're right, that was all just her planning everything out so that I'd fall completely in love with her and-"
"You actually loved her?" Xander clenched his teeth together quickly unsure of how to answer.
"I don't know."
"How do you not know? You either loved her or you didn't."
"I care about her and I understand why she acts the way she does… that doesn't necessarily make it okay or right, but it makes it understandable, and in many cases honorable. The odds were against her from the beginning and she still turned out to be a beautiful, personable, and capable. She's been through-"
"So much, I know," Buffy interjected. Xander couldn't help but laugh at her unbelievable ignorance to such a blatant case.
"Buffy, have you ever been ignored in bed?"
"What?" she asked. He realized the question was slightly odd so he re-phrased,
"Have you ever been with someone who doesn't care what you want in bed?"
"No, but that's probably because I don't sleep with freaks."
"Spike aside, right?" he asked quickly. The tone in the room was strange – it would be immediately suspected to be hostile and tense, but – not to claim that it was entirely void of such emotions – there was a weird amount of amiability in the conversation. Quips were taken as they should, as quips. Both defended their side of the argument devotedly but emotions were kept calmed. It was a type of conversation they had never had with each other before – for that matter, it was a conversation that none of the Scoobies had ever really had with each other. Conversations on Faith were usually avoided like the plague as was anything to do with Buffy's love life and more so, Buffy's love life compared to Faith's. Strange it was, without a doubt.
"Can you do me a favor, Buffy… just picture yourself in this situation… just for a second."
"I'll ignore the fact that this is something you do in second grade."
"Sometimes we need to digress in order to understand things more maturely," he stated as though he had read it out of a psychology textbook. Buffy knew for a fact Xander hadn't ever seen, not to mention touched a psych textbook.
"Fine."
"Picture yourself completely alone – I mean, without anyone to turn to or-"
"Got it, not that far of a stretch for me."
"Okay," he accepted, "you're with this guy because you're lonely and really it's the only way you can see to have someone around you that at least feels like they're there for you and care about you…"
"Once again, not a stretch," she admitted.
"Okay, good, you can really do this then," he encouraged. "Now as a slight background note, you were raped by your mothers boyfriend the day you walked in to find her dead body. You can understand the trauma of walking in to find your mom…" he acknowledged, "but think of it a little worse because she killed herself and is still lying in a pool of blood."
"Okay," Buffy answered, her tone becoming more and more serious each time.
"You've done things with this guy before, but you haven't slept with him, or anyone for that matter except for when you were raped." Now Buffy's acknowledgement was a silence nod and Xander continued. "You're about to have sex with him and you're trying really hard to not think about what happened before because you don't want to freak out and have sex be an issue for you the rest of your life… but you don't want to tell this guy what happened to you because you know he wouldn't understand and probably wouldn't really care."
"Nice," she muttered sadly.
"Before you start you ask him to go slow, hoping maybe he'll pick up that you're a little nervous and the response you get is, 'you're giving *me* advice on how to do this?' Followed by an obnoxious, 'God, there's nothing more fucking annoying than a chick who can't keep her mouth shut.' You'd think the mood would be killed right there, but he didn't seem to think so… he does his thing and expects you to be happy with it. So, Buffy, how do you feel?"
"Someone did that to her?" He shrugged and answered,
"Probably made the whole thing up, right Buffy?" he asked cynically, "she probably had it all laid out to hit just the right emotions too…" he continued, "you know, like when we'd be together and I'd ask her if she was okay, or if it was okay and she'd glue her eyes either down at the floor or over at the wall and not answer… all part of her wicked little plan, right?"
"I…" Buffy tried to force out some form of a response but could hardly muster a syllable.
"You have no idea how long it took for her to be able to look at me… or talk to me… or the winner, believe me when I told her I loved her. She always thought I was just full of shit and that it was just a reflex for a guy to say that when he was getting some from a girl."
"Did you?"
"Huh?'
"Did you love her? You said she didn't believe you… should she have? Did you really mean what you said to her?"
"I don't want to-"
"No, now I want to know," she demanded.
"Yes. I loved her… I still love her," he admitted as though it was a thought he was allowing himself to admit to himself for the first time.
"Then why did you break up with her?"
"Because I loved her so much…" he explained, "I couldn't stand the thought of having someone or something take her away from me so I pushed her away myself. It doesn't really make sense when you say it."
"Actually, that's not too far of a stretch for me to understand either."
-----------
Faith woke up letting out a painful scream. She tried to calm herself down but it took several minutes to regulate her breathing. She held her head in her hands trying to stop the flashing pictures that played on a constant reel on the back of her eyelids. She slowly sank back down on the bed resting her hand over her face letting herself imagine it was his calming hand wiping away her tears instead of her own. She stared blankly across the room rubbing her thumb softly across her cheek in a slow and soft rhythm trying to calm her senses as he did so many times.
*'I love you… and you love me-'
'No, I don't.'*
She didn't even know how to make herself stop crying anymore. Pictures flashing through her head of him making love to her and how it felt and everything about it should have made her feel better, made her feel needed, but now they just made her feel worse. She knew what she had lost and she wanted it back. She knew she needed to get over it but she wasn't sure she could. She was never going to even meet another guy like him, let alone have him as hers. Xander knew everything about her – things she wished he didn't, even – but he knew it and he understood where she was coming from when she did things. He understood… she could be in a really rank mood and he'd get why, or she could be really quiet and he'd understand, or she could be obnoxious and loud and he'd know… no matter what mood or act or front she through at him he took it, understood it, and worked with it.
Thinking about all the garbage he dealt with from her she understood why he wouldn't want her anymore. She knew she could never be with anyone like her – but that's what made him so fantastic, it was the fact that he knew her and still wanted her. She didn't have to hide anything… she didn't have to act any part for him… he knew her and he actually liked it. That was something she would never understand. Why would anyone want her? She couldn't blame him for what he did… if she were in his shoes she probably would've dumped her too. The idea brought back the feeling she got in the pit of her stomach when he broke it off with her. It made her both laugh and cry – the pain was so much but she wouldn't let herself feel sorry for herself. This wasn't her style – but then again, dating never was her style either. If someone had told her a few years ago that she was going to end up going steady with some guy, falling completely in love with him, and then having him dump her, not only would she not have believed them but they probably would've gotten an ass kicking too.
But there was one thing she couldn't stop herself from thinking about – just what it felt like when he made love to her. She could admit it; he was probably the one and only guy to make love to her rather than just screw, fuck, whatever you want to call it. There was a big difference between them… she couldn't get it out of her head the way it felt with him. She had been his first and even then, not to say it lasted all that long or to say that he had any clue – but it always had a really intimate feel. He liked to hold her and touch her and look at her. It was always a little bit more about her than it was about him and that was a rare thing to come by with a guy. She could practically feel his hands on her arms and neck – that was how vivid the memory was. She could feel his lips grazing softly over her skin and the way he felt and smelled and tasted on top of her.
She stood up off of the bed beads of sweat practically forming on her forehead thinking about him. She was going out. He had to get out of her head right now and she knew exactly how to do it – she had to go out.
------------
Xander left Buffy's house and headed back for the main headquarters as their conversation came to a closing. It was such a bazaar conversation that he felt like he couldn't even thinking about it anymore. He loved her… he wanted her back. Now rephrase – he needed her back. He had been on the borderline between running to go get her back and dealing with the pain, convinced it would surely fade and go away because it had been such a short-term thing. He forced himself to stop thinking about it to avoid doing something irrational. He walked into the house holding a few boxes of pizza and put them down on the counter.
The food was well received by all and within about thirty seconds the kitchen was filled with everyone. Kennedy and Willow were the last to come in. Kennedy looked a little off… she seemed angry and disappointed mixed with her usual weird mood since Faith had left. Kennedy had taken it almost as hard as he had. She lost someone she looked up to and depended on. Faith was important to her… and she just left. Kennedy would never be able to realize how much it hurt Faith to have to leave her too.
"So, how was everybody's day?" Xander asked grabbing a slice of pizza of out of the box.
"Boring," Andrew answered.
"I was working on that bookshelf," Wood began, "I could use some help with the electrical slot we wanted to put in it," he admitted. Xander nodded,
"Yeah, no problem. He looked over at Willow to see how her day was going, "how're the files going?"
"Umm… Xander, Faith called today," she spat out. The room went instantly silent as everyone hung on what she was saying.
"Is everything okay? Is she okay?" he asked a little too quickly to pass it off as normal concern. "What's wrong?"
"She actually called just wondering if you got the job with the construction company."
"Yeah…" he muttered. "She was pretty excited when I mentioned it to her…"
"She was really happy for you," Willow added.
"What else did she say?" he asked eagerly.
"She really didn't say anything else… she was disappointed you weren't home, but she was thrilled that you got the job," Willow assured him. He could tell by the tone of her voice that something was wrong.
"Willow, what's wrong?"
"I'm not going to lie, Xander, and we all know I'm not exactly president of Faith's fan club, never was never will be, but… she doesn't sound good. I was a little worried about her after talking to her on the phone for all of five minutes. She doesn't sound like she's doing so good."
-----------
Angel walked quickly down the corridor towards Faith's quarters in the Wolfram & Hart building. As he turned a sharp bend around the corner he ran right into Faith.
"Whoa, sorry," she said quickly, startled by the collision.
"It's alright. Are you okay?" he asked quickly, figuring she was coming to get him for something. Upon a second look at her it was fairly obvious that she was headed out.
"I'm five by five. Where you rushing to?"
"Coming to check on you, actually."
"I'm going out," she stated firmly.
"I don't really think that's a great idea right now. You're not feeling your best and there's going to vamps crawling the streets… I don't want you to get hurt."
"I'm going off duty tonight. No vamps for me… just a little liquor and a hottie and I'll be set to go," she added trying to walk around him.
"Faith, don't deal with it this way," he said almost begging.
"As Xander would say, this is me *not* dealing… it's not a situation needing dealing, it's one that needs forgetting. And like I said, liquor and a hottie and it'll be history…"
"I really don't want you to go."
"Then I guess it's a good thing it's not up to you, huh?" she asked sharply. She walked around him and headed out of the building.
---------
"Where are you going?" Giles asked seeing Xander heading for the garage door with a small duffle bag and a coat.
"L.A."
"Why?"
"I need to go make sure she's okay."
"You could probably call… it's a lot easier and it takes about four less hours."
"Not the way I drive."
"Xander…"
"Giles, I need her," he admitted. "I can't deal with this anymore so I'm going to get her."