Title: The Gift
Pairing: Willie Loomis/Maggie Evans
Fandom: Dark Shadows
Theme: #20 The Road Home
"Hurry, now...get on inside."
Maggie paused, glancing from Willie to the Evans' cottage and then back to him, again. "Why did you save me?" she demanded. "You said you couldn't before, but now..."
"I changed my mind, alright?" Willie growled, clearly troubled and embarrassed by her questioning.
"Willie..." Maggie reached out to him, turning his face to hers so that he was now forced to gaze into her eyes. Gasping upon her sudden discovery, she exclaimed, "Oh...you're crying!"
"Am not." Wiping his cheeks with his sleeves Willie immediately turned his back to her, urging irritably, "Go on, will ya? Your Pop'll be delighted to see ya, again."
"And I him" Maggie agreed, "but something's wrong here, and I'm not leaving until I know what it is."
Willie snorted. "Damn, you don't give up, do ya?" Jamming his hands into his pockets he turned and regarded her with pained eyes, revealing softly under his breath, "But then again, I guess that's what I love aboutcha so much."
Maggie gasped. "Willie..."
"Please stop" he begged, running his hand anxiously through his greasy mop of hair. "I-I've gotta, go, so I-"
"Wait" Maggie interrupted, suddenly seizing his hands within her own and holding them tightly, pleadingly.
Willie swallowed, staving off tears as the woman whom had single-handedly haunted him since the very beginning placed her lips gently against his own, her arms slipping about his neck as she gained courage and only deepened their kiss.
Willie was falling, drowning, spinning out of control, a tremendous burst of heat spreading within his chest as he released a pitiful moan into Maggie's open mouth and began to sob like a lovelorn fool.
He would never tell her, yet because of his treason to Barnabas he knew that he was destined to die...