Disclaimer: I didn’t invent these characters (except Parker and Joy)
Summary: Willow’s daughters are at home, sick with a small cold and Willow tells them a story
Rating: PG
A/N: This is where I’ll be putting all the short stories I have swimming around my head. As for my other story (Unbreakable Ties) I have the next three chapters all written out, but I wrote it at school in my notebook and need to transfer it to my computer. I know, I know “how hard is that?” Well, I’m not going to pretend like I haven’t been busy perusing the extensive “completed fics” archives that the Kitten Board has to offer, heh, sorry.
The day was bursting into an orange and purple mosaic of sky. Willow always enjoyed this time, in-between day and night. When they had first started dating, Tara had told her a story, all about how the sky turned so pretty before night-time because each individual day was celebrating its end and did so with a palette of colors it picked out—sometimes red, sometimes orange, or lavender, purple, violet, cobalt blue. Her wife told the best stories, but tonight she would have to do.
“All right, girls,” Willow turned to her two daughters who were currently stricken with a small cold, “what do you want to hear tonight?”
“Something demon-y!” Parker Anne Rosenberg-Maclay, that mouth-full of a name, smiled wryly up at her mother through a mass of short red hair.
“I can’t, baby,” Willow told her youngest daughter, before leaning in conspiratorially to whisper, “Momma’s within earshot.”
“I want to hear something romantic, Mommy!” Joy Rosenberg-Maclay clasped two skinny arms to her chest and looked at her mother through her big cobalt eyes.
“Ew, gross!” Parker scrunched her pretty face into a grimace that was cuter than it was indignant.
“You only think it’s gross because you’re a baby,” Joy told her sister factually.
“You’re only three years older than me!” Parker held up three fingers to Joy’s face.
“10 and 7 are completely different…you’d know that if you weren’t such a baby.”
“All right, all right, well, it’s Joy’s turn to pick so I’ll just have to tell a romantic story,” Willow resolved.
“Yes!”
“Oh no!”
“This story begins in the middle of another—just as romantic—story,” Willow began.
~~~
Xander and I were returning home from the grocery store in his new Volvo (which is now the old Volvo), see this was back when Momma trusted Mommy with grocery-type decisions.
“Are you sure Gummi Bears have vitamin C in them, Wills?”
That trust didn’t last for very long.
“No growing baby should be without a little Gummi in their diet, Xand, plus I’m sure there’s some sort of nutritional value hidden deep within its chewy goodness,” I smiled at him with bits of candy bear in between my teeth.
“Somehow, I don’t think Tara’s gonna buy it,” Xander’s smile turned from amused to amusedly wistful; “I can’t believe we have kids sometimes. I mean look at us, look at you; you have gummies in your gums.”
“That I do,” I smiled at him.
“It’s just hard to reconcile that with your career, your baby, your soon-to-be-wife,” Xander parked into the Summers’ driveway, “I feel like we’re still twelve some days, like you’re gonna come over in your pink Huffy with a stack of comics in its basket and we’re gonna sit around all day and wonder how cool it’d be to be Batgirl.”
“We still do that,” I told him, as I balanced three plastic bags on each arm.
“Yeah, but not as often.”
We headed for the Summers’ house which was where we lived back then, before Parker was born and before we bought this one, which, coincidentally, is right next to the Summers,’ though it isn’t a coincidence at all since we chose it for precisely that reason, but anyway.
When we came in we could hear Momma singing to Joy in the kitchen, and we could see her cradling little Joy in her arms and looking down at her with all the love in the world right on her beautiful face. The sun would come in through the kitchen windows and wrap itself all around her and I almost fainted at the sight of my baby there, holding my baby-girl. I wanted, for the rest of my life, to be met with that sight every time I walked through a door.
“When’d you get so damn lucky, Willster?” Xander asked from my right side.
“Day I met her,” I knew right then that I had a heckuva silly little smile on my face, but I couldn’t care too much because I was too damn happy to care.
“If you don’t make that girl your wife I know a million other lesbians that will, and it won’t be hard to find ‘em.”
“Tonight’s the night,” I whispered and I rubbed my hands together in anticipation and nervousness, and also, it’s always a little cold in that living room.
“How’s it going down, game plan-wise?”
“She thinks we’re going out to celebrate that new promotion I got, we’re going to her favorite place for dinner, then we’re gonna walk around downtown for a bit. That’s where you come in. You’re all set up right?”
“Yes, ma’am it’s all in perfect working order. How about you? Nervous?”
“Yes,” I practically hissed at him, “I can barely breathe when I think about it, and I know, she’s most likely going to say yes, I mean, we have a baby and we’re looking for a new house and all and if it hadn’t been for the state of California changing its mind so many darn times we would’ve most likely been married years ago, so I know she’s going to say yes, but…what if she doesn’t? You know, what if she doesn’t say yes?”
~~~
“Wait-wait, wait a second,” Joy interrupted, “you mean you guys had me before you were married?”
Parker grabbed her sides as she wriggled on the bed in laughter, “you’re illiterate!”
“That’s illegitimate—which you’re not, baby! You’re completely, one-hundred percent legitimate, it’s just that back then gay couples couldn’t get married like they can now, and we just couldn’t wait for the laws to be fixed to have you.”
“Oh, okay I get it now,” Joy smiled, “keep going Mommy.”
“When’s Momma gonna be done with our soup?” Parker asked.
“When I’m all done telling you this story…coincidentally.” Willow smiled, “So, by that time, Xander grabbed me by my shaking shoulders and told me, “Will,”
~~~
“Will, she’ll say yes. Trust me, okay; I’ve seen Tara look at you before. If you could step outside of yourself and just watch her looking at you, you’d know. It’s like no one else exists in this whole world except you.”
I could feel myself calming down, partly from what he was saying, and partly from the fact that at that moment Tara chose to turn around and fix me with a look that proved Xander’s statement completely right.
“Willow Danielle Rosenberg, are you just going to stand in that doorway whispering to Xander while your baby’s hungry?”
“No Ma’am!” I practically skipped all the way to the kitchen with Xander close behind and dropped the groceries on the countertop before kissing Tara square on the lips and then gathering little Joy up in my arms.
“Candy!”
“Willow,” Tara said, with her diligent hands placed right on her hips, “why is it that every time our daughter sees you, she yells out ‘candy’?”
“Baby,” I told her, “you know there’s no good reason for that.”
“Have you been feeding that baby candy?” She squinted her periwinkle eyes at me.
“No,” I said, lying as well as I could under the circumstances. See, I could never really lie to Momma, but she could never really accuse me of lying with no proof.
“Liar.”
“How come?” I pouted at her.
“Last week Joy gave me a kiss and got stuck to my cheek for a half hour.”
I lifted Joy up so we were nose to nose and told her, “this is the last time you rat me out,” then I proceeded to play Joy’s favorite game back then, ‘The Helicop-tickler.’
Through my periphery I could see that Tara couldn’t help smiling, even as she yelled out a ‘be careful’ at Joy and I while we spun across the expanse of the kitchen.
“So are you excited about your big date, tonight?” Xander asked her around a mouthful of the sandwich he had prepared for himself, with the food I had just bought, as Tara had been interrogating me about my candy-crimes.
“Yeah, I really am. Hey, what kind of sandwich is that?”
“Peanut Butter and Marshmallow Fluff,” he told her with a sheepish grin.
“Peanut Butter and Ma—Willow!” she yelled at me, but I pretended not to hear over Joy’s exuberant squeals and giggles.
That night we went to Momma’s favorite restaurant—you’ve both been there and I know you hate it because of all the veggies they put on everything so I’ll not gross you out with the green-colored details of what was on our plates, but I will tell you that we had a great old time just talking and eating and sneaking kisses.
Then we held hands as we walked all along downtown Sunnydale, Momma looked so beautiful that day, almost like she knew what was about to happen. She wore a flowing black skirt that would sway along her knees as we walked and a red top that left her alabaster shoulder blades exposed under the moonlight. What a knockout!
And I was a real nervous wreck, your Momma could tell.
She gave my hand a firm squeeze and said, “Baby, why so quiet? I usually have to make with the smoochies to tame that babble of yours.”
“Me? Nothing, I’m fine. Finey McFiney from Fineytown, that’s me, as a matter of fact I’m the mayor of that fine town and I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that our level of fine-ness is through the roof, if there was a fine-Olympics we’d take gold—or platinum—the best one, you know I don’t really follow sports at all. Though we should start, I’ve always wanted to do the wave.”
“Really?” At this point she raised one fine eyebrow at me—a gesture which usually means she’s not buying my story exactly but she’ll at least play along, “because usually when you say that, and your eyes go all wide like that…usually that means that you’re not fine.”
“I’m fine,” I assured, “I’ve just been rendered speechless by your ethereal countenance beneath these incandescent downtown lights, baby.”
“I think those incandescent downtown lights have zapped your brain.”
“Hey you! Yeah you! With the red hair, and the uncoordinated outfit! Flowers work better than those hackneyed lines you’re trying to pull, you know? Buy the girl a flower, buy the girl a flower!”
The high-pitched and highly annoying voice of the street vendor got both of our attentions and I led Tara to its source; it was a woman in her mid-twenties with hair that (thanks to peroxide) framed her face in blonde waves.
“Anya?” Your Momma’s eyes went wide at the sight of Auntie Anya standing there behind a booth of various brightly colored bouquets, “what’re you doing here?”
“Making a quick buck off your beau.”
Tara turned to me with bewilderment and amusement swirling prettily on her face and I tried my best to act confused too, I shrugged and told her, “get anything you want, baby.”
She started shaking her head, “y-you don’t have t—“
“Hey,” I tightened my grip on her hand and brought it to my lips to kiss, “I want to.”
She smiled up at me lopsidedly and through eyes that bore more love than I think anyone can stand, “Um, okay.” Her hand floated above a single flower, plain and simple.
“Not that one,” I told her.
Her ivory hand then hung in the air above a small bouquet of maybe five flowers, a bundle of the plain and the simple.
“Not that one,” I said.
She sighed and finally touched upon the prettiest bouquet, a dozen red roses tied together by an elaborate red ribbon that shone beneath the neon flare of downtown Sunnydale.
I handed Anya the money and when I looked into your Momma’s eyes I’d thought I’d faint at the sight of her expression—her eyes had gone hazy and misted over, making a color that was somewhere between cerulean and astonishing.
“Thank you baby, they’re wonderful.”
We kept on strolling a small ways before sure enough—
“Hey Red! Yeah you, c’mon, c’mon, flowers? How boring is that? What you need is the sugary smoothness of chocolate. Everyone knows you catch bees with honey and you catch the honeys with some chocolate. Right this way!”
The excitable voice came from one Auntie Buffy, who stood behind a display of an array of fine chocolates.
“Okay, what’s next? Dawnie and Joy are going to show up in a back alley and try to cajole us into a game of Three-Card Monte?”
“Don’t be silly;” I told Momma as I led her to the chocolate stand, “Dawn’s at least a better babysitter than that.”
“Is there some Scoobie Festival going on tonight that I’m not aware of?” Tara asked as we reached the stand.
“No slaying Tare,” Buffy told her, “just business.”
“Take anything you want, baby,” I spoke for the second, and not last in the least, time that night.
Tara’s hand stopped just short of a single, round chocolate piece wrapped in polyethylene.
“Not that one,” I told her.
Her hand then hovered above a bundle of three chocolate pieces wrapped in the same cheap material.
“Not that one,” I said.
Finally, she placed her dainty hand upon a large heart-shaped box decorated with lace trimmings and red ribbons; it looked like it housed at least twenty chocolate pieces.
“Willow baby, I don’t know what to say,” she said to me.
“Oh, baby, you don’t have to say a word. Your eyes tell a story, you know that? There are whole stories in your eyes.”
I took the hand that wasn’t busy cradling a bouquet and a heart-shaped box and swung it gaily between us; I was nervous and giddy and every beautiful feeling under the sun, but that’s just what love brings out in you. One day, you’ll both know what it’s like to be walking under the moonlight with half your soul hanging onto your arm, all warm and soft.
But it wasn’t long before we were interrupted.
“Hey you! With the out-of-your-league blonde hanging on your arm! Yeah, you—the pale-faced waif! You think some flowers—which will wither—and some chocolate—which will melt or be eaten—can beat out diamonds? Heck no! Diamonds are everlasting, and if you want to convince her that your love is too, you’ll head this way!”
Uncle Xander made a big show of calling us over, and by then I think your Momma had more-or-less caught on.
The stand held an array of diamond rings—plain ones with small diamonds, medium sized ones that looked like gilded plastic, all were cheap and obviously fake except one in the middle, placed carefully in a black velvet box. The platinum band was mottled with small diamonds that sparkled joyously and in its center, protuberant and proud, lay a large diamond with a square cut. The entire ring radiated with a silvery light and seemed almost magical beneath the beam of the moon.
“Willow, w-what’s--?”
I sunk down on one knee as my heart thumped so loudly that I could feel it with my entire body, “Now, I’m no poet, and I might babble my way through this meticulously prepared speech but I know you love my faults as passionately as my good qualities, so here goes—baby, from the moment I met you, I’ve measured my life out by the time I spend with you. If I’m not with you, then I’m not whole, I’m someone walking through life with a bunch of holes—like Swiss cheese or, or some sort of moon-crater-person—and that part wasn’t a part of the speech I wrote. The thing is, I can’t imagine waking up to a day where your head isn’t resting in the crook of my neck, because it belongs there. I can’t imagine a walk through the park where your hand isn’t laced in mine, because it belongs there. I can’t imagine coming home to any smile that isn’t yours, because I belong wherever you are. I belong with you. I love you, every part of you, every nook and cranny of your soul and your body, everything that’s ever happened to you to lead you to me. Every beautiful moment you’ve ever had—the stories you’d tell me about your mother and your grandmother, even the bad stuff, even the stuff that makes you believe you don’t deserve the very best of everything this world has to offer, because the bad stuff helped mold you into the one and only person who fits me, like a puzzle, the one and only person that I love, and I want to spend every day letting you know that I do, I want to spend every day giving you the very best of everything, because you do deserve it. That is, if you’ll let me…Tara Maclay, will you marry me?”
“Yes!”
And she was on me in an instant, with her arms around my neck even as she held on to the gifts I’d gotten her, she was crying and kissing me; enveloping me in all her love and happiness.
I could hear the Scoobies crowding around us, yelping in celebration. I could hear strangers applauding, and whistling in glee. I could hear them taking our picture and wishing us luck. But it all sounded like a buzzing in my head and body compared to Tara’s whisperings of love and dedication.
I grabbed the ring from the center of the table and slipped it on her finger and from that day on, we lived happily ever after—
~~~
“—Until Parker was born!” Joy finished for her Mommy.
“Hey!” the seven-year-old started, but the smell of her Momma’s Secret-Recipe Soup swayed her attention to the open door, “Momma! Soup!”
“I told you she’d make it in time,” Willow’s thin lips swung into a quirky smile as she looked up at her wife.
“Sorry if I took too long, are my sick girls hungry?” Tara made her way into the room, carefully balancing four bowls on a large wooden tray.
She was answered with a chorus of ‘yes!’
Willow looked on as her girls slurped soup hungrily into their small mouths, every now and then stopping to tell their Momma about this or that, she looked at her wife who smiled widely at them and listened attentively, all the while holding one hand to her belly which was swollen with the weight of a new life.
She blew on a spoonful of her own soup before swallowing contentedly—damn happily ever after felt good.
