Title – Plastic and Willow
Author name – eklipsej
Rating – PG
Disclaimer – All Buffy characters were created by and unfortunately belong to the creators of BTVS.
Feedback – Yes please!
Summary/Notes – This is, of course, our version of BTVS where the the last 5 minutes of Seeing Red and so on never happened and they all lived happily ever after. Still working on the assumption that Dawn was 13 during season 4. This is a companion to the previously stand-alone Simply Perfect.
Plastic. It’s just a piece of plastic.
It can’t be that big, I mean, after all, the box is only 6 or 7 inches long. That’s what I keep telling myself, but right now the box sitting on our bathroom counter holding that little piece of plastic is scaring the bats out of me. It really shouldn’t, the logical part of me knows that. But the other 95% of me is still scared.
Okay, not scared, nervous maybe?
One little piece of plastic and everything changes.
It’s just plastic Tara, get a grip!
What I really need is courage, and I know just where to find her. I give one last glare at the counter and walk out of the bathroom, pulling the door shut behind me. We definitely don’t want anyone, especially Dawn or Faith seeing that thing.
Our guests hardly ever use the master bath in our room, but…You never know…I turn and give a little wave of my hand, satisfied when I hear the faint click of our bedroom door locking behind me.
Willow and I have talked a lot in the past few years about the proper use of magicks, I’m pretty sure she’ll understand this one.
Speaking of Willow, I find her sitting with Dawn at our dining table. As I lean on the wall at the end of the hallway I can’t help but smile. Willow and Dawn are poring over three textbooks and two notebooks at once. I’m afraid to ask which subject it is this time. It could be Physics, Latin, or something more obscure, like the Sociological Impact of Feminist Theory in Developing Nations. I’m pretty sure Dawn is triple majoring, in what exactly I couldn’t tell you, mostly because I can’t remember all the words to at least one of her majors. I’d have to ask Willow.
Another voice draws my attention and I have to fight to suppress my laughter. Faith has taken up her usual position, sprawled out on the carpeted floor between the living room and the dining area. She is lying on her stomach, her legs swinging in the air as she asks Willow about polynumeral equations or derivative matrices or some thing like that.
I might be in a house full of geniuses right now. Goddess knows I’m most definitely in a house full of smart-alecks. Dawn rolls her eyes at something Faith says, Faith glares at her playfully, Willow shakes her head at both of them.
This little ritual of theirs was Willow’s idea.
Twice a week Dawn and Faith come over and they get to ask Willow anything about what they’re studying. I’m no slouch either; I’ve found myself joining their study sessions more often than not. Willow stands and walks over to our bookshelf. After a minute of searching she finds the books she was looking for. She drops one down next to Faith and returns to her seat next to Dawn. Between the three of them, they probably have enough books open for every person in one of my Women’s Studies classes back at UCSD.
Faith chews on one end of her pencil as she copies her notes from some crumpled up pieces of paper into a notebook. She complained about having to carry a “geeky-ass backpack,” so Willow gave her some loose-leaf and some very sharp pencils (also useful as emergency stakes should the need arise) to stick inside her pocket. Faith finds the page she needs in our book. She drops her pencil, picks up a red pen and scribbles in her notebook. When she’s done she picks up the pencil and starts chewing again.
Its official: Willow is contagious.
The fact that Faith is here laying on our living floor is a minor miracle, courtesy of Willow, of course.
It was Willow who had the summoned the courage to visit Faith in prison after Angel told us that all Faith wanted was a chance to apologize. She wasn’t looking for forgiveness, just the chance to ask for it. Willow gave her both.
It was Willow who dared to suggest that Faith come back to Sunnydale after Angel and the lawyers at Wolfram & Hart managed to arrange for her release.
It was Willow who had the balls, yes the balls, to finally call Buffy out after months of tension-filled patrols.
“Buffy,” she had said, “Why don’t you just get over yourself? You can pretend you still hate her all you want, you can tell yourself you’re not in love with her, but all you’re doing is hurting yourself, and Faith. So just get over yourself Buffy. Just…get over it.”
What followed after that was a lot of talking at loud volumes with really high-pitched voices, most of which Dawn and I missed, having retreated upstairs for fear of our eardrums.
When I came back down Willow and Buffy were in the living room staring at each other, not speaking. Willow was leaning back on the couch, her arms crossed, a smirk on her lips. Buffy was standing across from her, on the other side of the coffee table, also with her arms crossed, pouting.
Finally Buffy huffed and walked out of the living room. She paused at the bottom of the stairs, turned to Willow and said “You know I love you Will, but sometimes, I really, really hate it when you’re right.”
And it was Willow who had the nerve to suggest that Faith ask Buffy out on a date and convinced Buffy to agree.
About a year later we moved out and Faith moved in.
Faith started taking classes at UCSD and coming over with Dawn right after that.
Willow never ceases to amaze me. Other people might hear her babble or slip and say something mildly to extremely embarrassing and think she’s weak, or unsure, or a scatterbrain. But she’s the strongest, bravest, and smartest person I know.
If you asked her she’d say it was me, that I make her strong, but we both know that’s not true. Not completely anyway. When she hit the lowest place she could go, I wasn’t there. No one was there really, not even Buffy or Xander, not the way she needed us.
After the car accident with Dawn and that demon, nobody really knew what to do. Buffy made a good show of trying to help her go cold turkey, they even got rid of all magicky related things in the house. But Buffy was still trying to come to terms with being alive, not to mention figuring things out with Spike, so her thinking was more along the lines of: as long as Willow wasn’t doing magick everything was of the good. Nobody thought about how hard it would be for Willow during Scooby meetings, especially when they were held at the Magic Box. Nobody thought about how hard it was for Willow everyday to fight that itch, that pull to the dark magicks, how hard it was for her to reign in and refuse all the power that came with it.
That day Amy tried to get her to go back to Rack’s, it was Willow who slammed the door in her face. She was alone in the house, she could have gone and nobody would have been the wiser. But she said no, warned Amy to stay away from her.
When we got trapped on Buffy’s birthday, and Anya was pressuring Willow to use magick to free us, Willow stood her ground. Even Buffy and Xander looked like they were going to cave, to agree with Anya. Yes, I stepped in then. Even though I hoped Willow wouldn’t give in, I couldn’t bear to see the guilt on her face, knowing that her refusal might mean death for someone she loved.
And yes, I was disappointed to know that she had kept some herbs, but she was trying to figure out how to get through it by herself, so she did it the only way she knew how. The important thing was that she was trying.
Somehow, when all the chips were down, she found the strength to try.
Looking back on it now, I think they all would have expected her to go ballistic and turn all black-eyed Dark Magic Willow after Warren Meers accidentally shot me. I was very lucky, the bullet went straight through my shoulder. A few inches lower….
I passed out from the blood loss and for a minute Willow thought I was dead. She said it was the longest minute of her life. But she fought the rage that was threatening to burst from inside her. She fought the dark magick that hummed in the air, calling out to her for vengeance, revenge, retaliation. She kept her senses enough to check for a pulse, yell for Dawn to call 911, and keep pressure on both sides of the wound until the paramedics came.
I told you Willow was amazing.
She’s looking up at me now with that cute little smile and an apologetic shrug. I smile back in an ‘it’s okay’ way. How could she have known that Dawn and Faith would show up three hours early because classes were cancelled? There was no way to anticipate that one of the new janitors would blow a fuse and knock out all the electricity for the entire UCSD campus.
Willow is responsible for that thing in our bathroom though. It was her idea to get it today. The talking about it was getting to both of us and finally she dragged me out of the house and to the store. Well, she didn’t actually have to drag me. When it comes to Willow I’m willing to follow her just about anywhere.
On this particular occasion I found myself following her out of the house and into the car. Of course, once we got to the store both her resolve and mine seemed to falter. We must’ve walked past the aisle three or four times until no one else was there. I don’t know why we were embarrassed, but we both felt a little guilty, like maybe we were doing something wrong? When we finally started looking through the boxes it took forever to pick. Of course Willow pulled one of each down from the shelves to do a side-by-side comparison.
The clerk at the register looked at us funny while we were paying, until Willow glared at him and asked if there was a problem.
Goddess I love it when she gets all butch.
And I love watching her like this, when she’s all focus-y. Her word, not mine. Suddenly I’m hit with the image of Willow sitting with a beautiful little girl with her extra-flamey red hair and sea green eyes, reading from a Scientific American or Economist or some other terribly advanced reading material. And I love it.
But for that day to come, well, there’s other things that need to happen, things which involve that thing sitting on our bathroom counter.
I sigh deeply and return to our room, making sure to relock the door behind me. Just for good measure I also lock the bathroom door.
Ten minutes later I’m back in the same position I was in before I went outside, sitting on the edge of the tub, wringing my hands and staring at that darned box.
My fingers pass over the rings on my left hand, our wedding band and engagement ring. The memory of the day Willow proposed to me comes rushing back. There was nothing special about that day really, except that Willow got up earlier than usual. I figured she had some work to get done, since she immediately went into hiding in her office.
For the longest time she worried that I might leave her again, that she wouldn’t be worthy enough to deserve a second chance at us. Even after I moved back in. My silly, silly Willow.
But somehow, without even my realizing it (and this is me we’re talking about here), she was able to overcome those fears.
And one morning, not unlike any other until that moment, she asked me to marry her.
My darling, darling Willow.
Have I mentioned yet how much I love this woman? Or how much she loves me?
She loved me even when she was scared her friends would reject her for being gay, during those nights when we were just friends, staying up late doing spells as an excuse to spend as much time with each other as possible.
She loved me even when I was so lost, after Glory…she found a way, she found me.
She loved me even after I left her to deal with her addiction alone. I felt like I had lost my Willow, and I didn’t know if I would find her again. But she did it, she found herself. Then she found me, one day in the hallway, she found me.
She always finds me.
The night my family came to the Magic Box, I would have left, even after Buffy, Dawn and the others told my father and brother to back off. I would have, except that meant leaving Willow behind. We may have floated above the dance floor later that night at the Bronze, but standing there in the Magic Box, while all her friends, our family, were standing up for me, I was lost in Willow’s eyes, and I was in heaven.
And we haven’t come down yet.
For Willow, anything…
I stand and take the four steps to the sink resolutely. As I reach for the box, I see the rings on my hand and I can’t help but smile.
I open the box and let its contents slide out into my waiting hand. It’s not as heavy as I thought it would be. I read the instructions one final time. It’s really not that difficult to use either, Willow made sure of that.
Here goes nothing Baby.
Five minutes later I find myself leaning against the wall at the end of the hallway once more, all too aware of the extra weight in my pocket.
Faith has taken Willow’s seat next to Dawn, and Willow is now standing behind them chairs, watching as Dawn and Faith work out something on a piece of paper.
Willow looks up at me then and I give her my patented Tara-grin, the one she says gives her goosebumps.
She smiles and her lips move.
Love you Tare.
I mouth back.
Love you Will.
She returns her attention back to Faith and Dawn, who are so engrossed in their problem that they don’t register that I’m watching them. I can’t wait for the picture I had imagined to become a reality.
I walk over to the table, next to Willow. She shifts to stand behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist and pulling me to her. I’m actually a little taller than she is, but when she holds me this way I feel like I’m wrapped in a Willow-cocoon. I take a deep breath, enjoying the tingle that comes every time she touches me. I peek at the books on the table, optical physics.
I feel her lips against my neck, followed by the warmth rising in my cheeks. My eyelids flutter as the tip of her nose tickles behind my ear.
Turning my head to look at her, I pull her left hand down from my waist and lay it to rest flat just below my stomach.
Baby.
I mouth the one word to her.
Her brow furrows, confused. I pull the tester from my pocket and show her the little window. She looks from my face to the little plus sign several times, her mouth gaping.
I feel her hand on my abdomen pull me closer as her jaw snaps shut.
Baby?
She asks silently.
I nod.
Baby.
“Baby.” She whispers and her lips curl into a smile that lights up her beautiful green eyes and makes her aura almost blinding.
Willow and I are having a baby.
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