Willow walked into the downstairs lab to find only Fred there, though that wasn't an unusual occurrence.
"Hey Fred, anything I can do for you?"
"You know there always is Willow. What's up, bored or something? I thought you were going to take the day off."
Willow sighed. "I had another fight with Kennedy. I needed to get out of the room." She explained.
"Oh, sorry. If you ever want to talk…." She left the offer on the table. She and Willow were getting to be pretty good friends. Willow was working in the lab until she could go back to school, and the two were both enjoying having a friend who liked science and learning in general as much as they did.
"Yeah, maybe sometime. Thanks Fred. So, what are we working on?" she changed the subject.
They got engrossed in their work, but about twenty minutes later Willow sighed again.
"She's just…so different from me. We really have so little in common. You know I want her to get her GED, but all she wants to do is party and occasionally stake a couple of vamps. I think she thinks I'll support her or something."
"Are you two that serious?" Fred asked, surprised.
"I don't know. It's weird, we got serious so fast in Sunnydale, everything was so intense there. But ever since…sometimes I wonder why we're even together anymore." Willow admitted.
"Do you want to break up with her?" Fred asked gently.
"I don't know! I've never broken up with someone before…Oz broke up with me, and Tara…" she trailed off.
"Are you sure it's not just because she isn't Tara? I'm not saying you should or shouldn't break up with her, I just know she thinks she has to live up to Tara." Fred asked quickly.
Willow groaned. "I know. Really, she brings up Tara more than I do. Whenever we fight especially. She blames any problem on the fact that she can't be Tara. I don't want her to be Tara. But I do want her to be responsible and educated…Even if I'd never met Tara I wouldn't want to date someone who didn't care if they had a high school diploma!"
"Willow, maybe it isn't my place, but it really seems to me, from an outside perspective, that the two of you aren't right for each other. You fight all the time. You are in two completely different places in your lives. I'm sure your relationship was important in Sunnydale, but maybe that's all it was supposed to be." She said gently.
"I know. I know I should break up with her. I just….don't know how to do it."
"I think you should just tell her that. That you don't think you are right for each other anymore, that the relationship is not working now." Fred suggested.
"I don't want to hurt her…"
"Would you have wanted Oz to stay in Sunnydale just so he didn't hurt you? When it was important for him, and also for you, to move on? I think she'd be more hurt if you tried to stay together and you ended up hating each other but staying together because you were used to it." Fred had heard all about Willow's history, and felt sorry for the redhead that she had been through so much pain. And that was just in her relationships.
"Fred, how did you get so smart about relationships? I mean no offense, but I've never heard you talk about you dating someone." Willow asked.
Fred giggled. "Well, I read a lot. I have dated a few people, but I must admit most of my ideas don't come from actual experience, so take it with a grain of salt."
Willow grinned. She was so glad she had come back to LA. Being with her friends again, getting to be friends with Fred…and she knew she never would have had the courage to break up with Kennedy without Fred's help.
"What do you mean, you are breaking up with me?" Kennedy yelled.
Willow winced. "Exactly what I said. I don't think we are good for each other anymore. We really have nothing in common, except for the fact that we helped defeat the First last year. I'm going to be starting school soon, and you are…not. I need to be with someone who takes the things I care about seriously. The two most important things in my life are magic and school. You don't understand or care about either." Kennedy tried to interrupt her but Willow held up her hand. "Wait. Let me finish. You should be with someone who wants to go out partying with you, instead of wishing she was back in her room fooling around on the computer. Kennedy, this isn't negotiable. I have made up my mind. Now, I'm going to stay here obviously. If you want to stay here I can't stop you, though it might get weird. I know you don't really want to be here anyway so I figured you'd want to leave. Maybe Giles can set you up somewhere, helping train the new slayers. I'm sorry if this is hard on you. I'm going to stay with Xander for now." Willow picked up the last of her bags. She had already moved most of her stuff into his room.
Kennedy stood in the room watching Willow go. Her fists were clenched in anger. Who was Willow to break up with her? "Whatever, who said I'd care?" she yelled after her ex-girlfriend. "I'll find someone who actually wants me!" The slayer stormed out of the room to find something to beat up.
Willow ignored the girl's ranting and walked into Xander's room, flopping onto her bed.
"Didn't go well?" Xander asked.
"How can breaking up with someone ever go well? I mean, not that I've ever been breakup-girl… But she was more mad than sad which made it easier. It reminded me of why I was doing it." Willow's glistening eyes betrayed the fact that she was sad herself.
"Hey, no crying, it's better this way remember? I'm proud of you Wills. I think we need to go out for chocolate ice cream. Let's go get Buffy, okay?"
Willow sniffed and nodded, and they went off for post-breakup ice cream.
Two days later, Willow woke up and found a note slipped under the door. Kennedy had returned to her parents' house.
Nearly a month after Kennedy's departure, Xander looked at a calendar and realized that Willow's birthday was in a few days. He walked to Buffy's room. The door was open.
"Hey Buff. What are we doing for Willow's birthday? I just realized it's on Saturday."
"Oh yeah, I meant to talk to you about that. Dawn suggested we take her to a gay club. You think she'd like that? She's been mopey-girl since she broke up with Kennedy."
Xander thought for a minute. "I don't know, do you think she wants to date again?"
"She doesn't have to do anything, just dance. We just thought maybe it would be a change."
"Want to surprise her? We haven't had a surprise party in forever." Xander suggested.
That Saturday night, Willow was sitting in her room feeling sorry for herself. Nobody had even remembered that it was her birthday! Not that they had done much special for her last few birthdays, but at least her friends had remembered it. There was a knock on the door. She opened it to find Fred.
"Hey, Willow, glad you are here! Something's going down, we've got to meet the others right away. Let's go!" she rushed off, not even giving Willow a chance to respond. Willow sighed and ran after her friend.
"Where are we going?" she finally asked once they were in Fred's car.
"Oh I don't know, Angel gave me directions." She handed them to the witch to navigate.
Soon they pulled up in front of what appeared to be a club or a bar. Angel was standing outside.
"Finally!" he said to Fred impatiently as they got out of the car.
"Hey, we got here as soon as we could!" she responded as they walked to the door.
Willow followed them in, but stopped short when she saw all of her friends clustered around a table with a bunch of wrapped presents and a cake.
"Happy Birthday!" they all yelled as soon as they saw her.
Willow grinned. "I knew you didn't all forget!"
Xander walked forward and gave her a big hug. "Yeah, Will, like I'd be able to forget your birthday! I've only known you for what, eighteen of them?"
Willow hugged the rest of her friends. Buffy, Dawn, Xander, Angel, Fred, Spike and even Wesley and Lorne were there. Only one person missing…but she pushed those depressing thoughts to the back of her mind as she looked around.
"What's with the bar guys?" she asked.
"Oh, sorry about that, we didn't really know of any so Fred looked online. I guess we didn't do so great…" Buffy apologized, looking around.
Willow looked around too, trying to figure out what was wrong with the place. She saw mostly older women sitting around, and a few younger ones dancing in a corner. Her eyes widened and she turned bright red as she realized what kind of a bar they were in and why.
"You guys came to a lesbian bar? For me?"
"Well, we thought there would be more hot younger ones…ow!" Xander glared at Buffy who had clearly just kicked him under the table. "For you, of course, not us!"
Willow rolled her eyes. "It's okay Buffy, we all know about his lesbian fantasies. But um, really, it's okay, I don't think I'd be ready to meet someone anyway. I need some time on my own. But so cool that you guys tried! Can I open my presents first or should we have cake?"
"What about the drinks? We're in a bar and you lot aren't even going to drink?" Spike said, taking a swig from his own beer.
"Er…I don't know, I'm not a big drinker…" Willow remembered one of the few times she had been drunk, years ago after Oz had left. It hadn't been much fun. Kennedy had often tried to get her to drink but she hadn't usually. "Oh, what the hell, it's my birthday."
"That's the spirit love!" Spike cheered. "Drinks all around then!"
"Except for Dawn." Buffy reminded her sister.
"I know, I know! I don't want it anyway. Alcohol is gross." Dawn proclaimed.
The party went very well. Willow liked all of her presents and she had fun just being around her friends, until suddenly Dawn grabbed her head.
"Oh not now!" Buffy groaned.
Dawn slumped to the table. Buffy caught her and shook her until she groggily opened her eyes.
"What did you see, li'l bit?" Spike asked.
"Vampires…so many vampires…going to San Francisco. Fighting…" she murmured.
Buffy turned to Angel. "Why would she see something so far away? And vamps? What's so special about vamps that we need a premonition about them?"
"Actually it's odd. There aren't really any vampires in San Francisco. Some old agreement with demons. I don't know why they would be going there." Angel responded.
"Should we go check it out?" Buffy asked worriedly.
"Road trip!" cheered Xander.
"Well, we have the use of the Wolfram and Hart private jet." Angel suggested. "I have to stay here, but you could go with Dawn."
"Hey, if we are going on a private jet we are so going too!" Willow pointed out.
"Me too!" Spike said. "Er, I mean, I could help, you know, ask around, see what the other blokes are up to." He corrected hastily.
"Fine, us four and Spike." Buffy agreed, rolling her eyes at the bleached vampire.
See? Told you I'd get rid of Kennedy quickly. And don't worry, the Halliwells are coming soon!