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TITLE: Close Quarters
AUTHOR: Laragh
CHAPTER RATING: PG-13
DISCLAIMER: Willow, Tara and any other characters from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer franchise belong to Joss Whedon, FOX, ME and a whole host of other entities, none of which are me.
SUMMARY: What happens when Willow and Tara are thrown together far away from home? Tara has secrets, Willow has a lonely past. They both want to be loved. Can they find it together? (Of course they can, this is me!)
SPOILERS: AU fic, so at most minor references or pieces of dialogue
FEEDBACK: Yes please
Chapter 15/20
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Tara shot up in bed when she heard a knocking on her window and ran over, pushing the large panes of glass upwards. Willow scrambled in as quickly as she could and their lips were on each other instantly, deeply.
“Oh god, baby, I missed you,” Willow’s words rushed from her mouth between kisses, “I missed you so much.”
They walked, locked at the mouth, backwards, until the back of Tara’s knees connected with the bed and they fell back onto it. Willow pulled away and placed a quick, gentle kiss against the brunette’s lips before grabbing the small travel clock on her nightstand and twisting the hand that was meant for the alarm around.
“55 minutes until I need to be back in my room for checks. I set it for five minutes before that.”
Tara nodded in understanding before ducking her head slightly.
“You were...really believable earlier.”
“God...” Willow said, shuddering at the memory of her public ‘breaking up’ broadcast earlier that day, “Even though I knew it was fake and I knew you knew it was fake, it was so hard saying those things to you. It felt so wrong. They actually felt like acid in my mouth.”
“Wasn’t too much fun hearing them either,” Tara replied, remembering how she’d felt as if it were real, that Willow really was saying those things to her and how hurt she’d felt, “Or getting all the stares after you left.”
“I’m sorry,” Willow responded, placing a kiss against the brunette’s temple, “But hey, it worked. The plan worked. The whole school, staff included think we’re broken up so they’ll think that’s the end of it and not probe anything.”
Tara nodded with a small smile. They’d been dragged down to their new separate rooms – on the same ground floor but at opposite ends – before they’d had a chance to think of some way that they could still be together without facing harsher consequences.
Luckily, both had logged onto facebook when they’d unpacked in their new rooms and were so able to converse without anyone else finding out, since the faculty had no reason to suspect either girl had internet access.
They’d been able to think up the fake break-up plan there and had figured out that they could see each other at night time, if Willow left her room through the window, ran the short distance along the outside of the school to Tara’s room – which was easy to determine which one it was since it was the very last window – and then sneak back the same way within the hour. All they had to do was keep away from each other in the halls and no one would think they had anything to do with each other anymore.
“Oh, oh and baby!” Willow said excitedly, her face lighting up, “I was walking around the school earlier ‘cause I had nothing else to do since we couldn’t hang out together and did you know there was a forest behind the hockey pitch?”
Tara didn’t see how the start of her girlfriend’s sentence connected with the last part of it but was quite used to her random topics.
“Um, no,” she replied, shaking her head, “I didn’t know that.”
“Baby, a forest!” Willow said when she didn’t get the response she was aiming for, “A secluded, deserted forest that I didn’t know about and you didn’t know about so it’s pretty fair to say that not many other people know about it...”
Tara continued to look bewildered for a second before comprehension dawned and her face lit up.
“We can meet up there after classes? So we can see each other for more than an hour at night?”
“Yep,” Willow nodded excitedly, “I’ll draw you a map of how to get to the forest and there’s this huge, like huge oak tree right in the middle. You can’t miss it. That can be like our meeting place.”
Tara felt a huge grin break out on her face and swooped her head up to kiss her girlfriend.
“Willow, you’re a genius. I love you.”
“Love you too,” Willow replied between gentle kisses, “Always.”
They continued to softly kiss, never getting too heated, just exchanging tender expressions of love in the wake of the test their relationship had been put under until the quiet ringing of the clock disturbed them. Willow quickly turned it off so the noise wouldn’t draw attention to the room and sighed.
“Yea, an hour at night definitely isn’t enough time with you. Check your facebook in the morning, I’ll post the directions to the forest on your page. You really just hang a left and keep walking after the hockey field. Anyway, I better go.”
Willow jumped off of the bed and walked back over to the window, Tara following her and pulling her into a quick kiss.
“You put a book under your window so it wouldn’t close, right?” she asked as Willow started to climb out.
“Of course,” Willow smiled, now standing outside the room, “Let’s just be thankful the single rooms are all on the ground floor. Although I would’ve trailed the trellises if I had to. Anything to be with you.”
Tara smiled and leant through the windowpane for a final kiss.
“Go back to your room. It’s cold out there.”
“Don’t worry, baby, I’m wearing socks,” Willow giggled before giving a wave, “Love you. Forest, tomorrow, after class.”
Tara nodded and waved back.
“I’ll be there.”
Tara hung her head out the window and watched as Willow ran the short, straight distance to the other end of the floor and saw her climb in her window. She quickly pushed her window down until it was closed and then lay back down on her own bed, looking around the small room. She’d gotten used to hearing the gentle snores of her girlfriend, they almost acted as a lullaby for her, soothing her into a peaceful sleep.
Suppose I’ll just have to get used to the quiet again...
She turned on her side and pulled the covers over her body before feeling around the bed until her hand fell on the familiar feel of the heart-shaped soft toy that Willow had won her on their birthdays. She brought it up to her nose and inhaled it’s scent, smiling when she recognised the aroma of the perfume her girlfriend wore; Tara having sprayed the fragrance on the toy soon after she’d gotten it so it always smelled like Willow.
Cuddling the toy against her chest comforted her and she felt herself start to drift off just before her door opened quietly. She saw the light of a flashlight behind her closed eyelids and kept them closed as the light was turned off and her door closed again, a small grin playing on Tara’s lips.
Their plan had worked perfectly the first night. And it could only get easier from then on, right?
***
Willow anxiously checked her watch for the tenth time in the past minute and tapped her foot impatiently. Class had let out over half an hour ago - more than enough time for either of them to deposit their laptops back in their rooms and slip out of their uniforms and into regular clothes - and Tara still hadn’t showed up at the oak tree.
She knew her girlfriend hadn’t been kept back in class because they’d both had history together for their last period and she had watched the brunette leave before her as she was still gathering her things. She was just contemplating forgoing their plan and going on a search for her when she felt familiar strong arms wrap around her waist from behind.
“Tara...” she whispered quietly, leaning back into the embrace.
“Your one and only,” Tara whispered back, “Hi.”
“Hi.”
They stayed in that position for a few long moments, enjoying being near one another until Willow turned and put her hands on her hips.
“You’re late.”
“Sorry,” Tara replied, genuinely apologetic, “I wanted to recheck your directions before I came out here. I always just thought this was a line of trees, I didn’t realise it reached inwards.”
“Well lucky for us, it does,” Willow grinned, hooking her thumbs into the belt loop of the brunette’s jeans as she waggled her eyebrows, “Wanna roll around in the bushes?”
Tara laughed and looked around them, eyeing the fallen leaves and discarded pieces of bark that littered the ground before scrunching up her nose.
“It doesn’t look very comfortable.”
Willow looked around them as well and frowned.
“Yea...Oh wait, there’s a green area, I saw it yesterday,” Willow said, pointing behind them and to the left, “It’s um...I think it’s that way...?”
“Up here?” Tara asked, taking the redhead’s hand and walking them in the direction pointed out.
Willow nodded and surveyed their surroundings.
“Yea, it wasn’t too far...it was like behind these two – oh here, through here, baby.”
She pulled them through a wedge between two bushes to an a small-sized area of grass, unkempt but short, surrounded either side by a variety of different trees and plant life all around as the forest stretched even further out behind the grass.
“All we need is an apple tree and we have our very own Eden,” Tara quipped, looking around.
The untidy, probably because they were unknown, gardens were hardly picturesque perfection but it was private and that made it paradise in Tara’s book.
“You can be my forbidden fruit,” Willow replied, grinning at her girlfriend, “Do I get a nibble?”
Tara blushed and the redhead bumped her hip playfully before dropping to her knees and patting the grass. Once satisfied it was free of any wetness or dirt, she stretched out, resting her arms behind her head. Tara followed her lead and lay down beside her.
“My parents finally called back,” Willow spoke up after a moment.
Tara turned her head towards the smaller girl.
“What did they say?”
Willow got a cynical look on her face.
““Mom said it was normal to experiment at our age and it seemed like a waste of time to tell her I wasn’t experimenting, I was in love. Oh and she said that teenagers engaging in sexual acts was standard common practice and was pissed that the headmistress wasted her time to call and tell her,” she responded before turning to Tara, her smile lessening in its bitterness and turning into amusement, “But my Dad wasn’t surprised at all that I was caught with another girl. He said he assumed I knew that he knew I was gay and that we didn’t just talk about it. I apparently ooze gayness.”
Tara giggled softly.
“Well that’s a pretty good reaction overall, right. I mean, no...no anger or anything.”
“Yea,” Willow nodded, before leaning over for a gentle kiss, “Sorry yours was a bit more suck-y.”
Tara just shook her head, not wanting to think about her father and they lapsed into a comfortable silence until the brunette spoke up again.
“You own my heart, you know that right?”
Willow’s eyebrow raised and she smiled.
“Where did that come from?”
“Everything almost fell apart when we got caught,” Tara replied softly, “And you made it all better. You always make it all better. So I just wanted you to know that no matter what, I’ll always belong to you.”
I’m not going to be able to physically be with you soon, but I’ll always and forever be completely yours.
“Well I’ll always belong to you too, baby,” Willow replied, her heart warmed, “I’m gonna marry you someday, you know that?”
Tara’s eyes widened and Willow’s mouth formed a surprised ‘o’ shape as she realised what she’d said.
“I, um...I only meant to think that,” Willow spoke again after a moment, before clearing her throat, “But I meant it. I know you’re my forever. I don’t care how young we are, when you meet your soulmate...you just know.”
Tara didn’t know what to say.
She felt the same.
She felt the exact same.
Often times, when she’d been lying in bed about to drift off she’d have images flash before her of a future where she was actually happy, a future with Willow. She saw them travel together, grow old together, have children together and, as the redhead had suggested, get married.
She hated that she knew they were just fantasies that could never come to fruition. But she clung to them. Because she knew that when she was forced back to live with her father and brother, they’d be all she’d have.
“I’d love to marry you someday,” Tara eventually responded, again trying to ease her guilt over the things she was keeping from her girlfriend by ‘lessening the lie’.
She really would love to marry the redhead someday. She just knew she’d never be able.
Willow beamed at the response though and entwined their hands between them as they both looked up at the sky.
“Wanna cloud-spot?” Tara asked after a moment, needing to fill the silence so she could sidetrack the thoughts going through her head.
“Okay,” Willow agreed happily, “Um...that one there...it kinda looks like...it looks like...a cloud. I’m not every good at this.”
Tara moved her body so she was cuddling into the redhead’s side and Willow wrapped an arm around her shoulders.
“We can just talk.”
“Cool,” Willow nodded, stroking the brunette’s shoulder, “Oh I heard a joke last night online! Wanna hear?”
“Sure,” Tara replied, resting her arm over the smaller girl’s waist, “Shoot.”
“Okay, so a man and his wife were having an argument about who should brew the coffee each morning, right? The wife said, ‘You should do it, because you get up first, and then we don't have to wait as long to get our coffee’. But the husband said, ‘You’re in charge of the cooking around here and you should do it, because that is your job, and I can just wait for my coffee.’ But the wife’s having none of that and replies ‘No you should do it, and besides it is in the Bible that the man should make the coffee.’ The husband is like no way and he replies, ‘I can't believe that, show me.’ So the wife goes and gets the bible and she opens up the New Testament and shows him that it says on the top of loads of pages: ‘HEBREWS’. Get it? He-brews. Hebrews! Just a little Jew humour.”
Tara snorted and buried her head into her girlfriend’s side.
“Willow, that was terrible.”
“Oh yea, well...” Willow retorted indignantly, “Well then tell me a better one.”
“Okay...” Tara raised her head with a smile, “Um...Knock, Knock.”
“Who's there?” Willow asked diligently.
“Atch!”
Willow’s brow crumpled in confusion but she continued to play along.
“Atch who?”
Tara grinned before delivering the punchline.
“I'm sorry, I didn't know you had a cold!”
Willow let a small snigger before rolling her eyes.
“That was worse than mine. At least my joke had substance and plot.”
“Yea, well mine’s a classic,” Tara countered, “You can’t beat a good Knock, Knock joke.”
“When you’re 5!”
Tara hit her girlfriend playfully on the arm before smiling down at her.
“I could spend every second of every day looking into your eyes.”
Willow grinned.
“Your vision would get blurry.”
“Willow-blurry,” Tara replied, dotting her fingers on her girlfriend’s stomach, through her t-shirt, “And that’s the best kind of blurry.”
Willow yanked the brunette’s shirt so that Tara fell on top of her and they both giggled.
“I can’t imagine not being with you,” Willow said after a moment, “It’s so...just so strange that there was a time when you weren’t part of me. That we weren’t in love.”
Tara leant her head down so the smaller girl wouldn’t notice the look on despair on her face.
“I know, Willow,” she whispered a second later, trying not to let the lump in her throat affect her voice, “Us not being together isn’t something that even seems possible.”
Even though it’s those thoughts that haunt me every day.
Last edited by Laragh on Wed Dec 14, 2011 7:44 am, edited 1 time in total.
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