Summary: Willow comes back from a long trip, and has some things to tell
someone.
Spoilers: Minor through the fourth season of Buffy.
Disclaimer: Joss made the characters. I like to make them insanely happy.
Rating: PG13
Author's Note: This is for Laura, who requested (and I quote), "A goddamned
happy W/X fic," and for Lucy, because I'm scared of her wrath. <G>
by: Amy
* * * * * * *
"Willow? What are you...? Hi!"
Willow looked up, smiling at an upside-down Xander. "Hiya." She struggled
to pull herself into a sitting position, from where her head had been hanging
over the edge of the bed.
"What are you doing here, if it's okay for me to ask?" He grinned, sitting
down next to her.
She flopped her feet into his lap. "Bein' drunk."
Xander raised his eyebrows. "You're being drunk at my house?"
"On your bed is more like it." She wiggled her eyebrows, then laughed. "You
have me bein' drunk in your bed! I gotta hand it to you, Xander."
"Hand what to me?"
"I dunno." She shrugged. "Just one of those 'spressions."
"Willow." He shifted closer to her, concerned. His hand gently began
massaging her feet. "Are you okay?"
"Mmm..." She relaxed, nearly purring. "Now I am. My feet were hurting.
From the walk, you know."
"You do know that you don't usually drink unless something is wrong, don't
you?" he asked slowly.
"Yup." She nodded brightly. "'Cept right now, nothing is wrong. I'm here
with you, and my feet feel good, and the room is kind of spinny, but in the
fun way, like on a roller-coaster. Not the bad, drunky way. I was thinkin',
earlier. Xander?"
"Yeah?"
"You know that spot we used to go to? The one by the lake? The... What's
it's name called?"
"The park?" he ventured gently, amused.
"Right. Want to..." A yawn broke through her sentence. "Want to go there
again? We haven't been there since... High school, I think. And... I miss
you. I miss everyone. It doesn't seem like I ever see anyone anymore. Not
since, you know, I left. But I miss everyone. I missed you most of all,
Scarecrow."
Xander laughed. "We missed you, too, Will. Though I have to admit, I didn't
see the reunion taking place in my bed, while you're drunk."
She looked at him, indignantly. "You don't want a drunk Willow in your bed?
Then Willow will leave your drunk bed, and you won't have to see Bed Willow
again!"
He shook his head, a bit too quickly. "That's not what I meant. I'm just
surprised." He lowered his voice. "Why are you drunk?"
"I just... I felt bad inside, Xander," she said slowly, grinding at her eyes
with her fists. "Like I was part missing. I don't like feeling like that.
You were the part that was missing, I think. I'm not going away again."
"I wish you wouldn't," he admitted softly.
She pulled her feet out of his lap and shifted positions until she was lying
on her stomach with her head on his thighs. Xander looked down and resisted
the urge to groan. Her fingers played with his knees. "Do you remember?
Remember when there wasn't anything else for us but us? And we had twenty
different clubs... The We Hate Cordelia club and the Twinkie club and the
Boys and Girls Only club? Remember when it was just us?"
"All the time," he whispered, smoothing her silky hair back.
"Don't you wish you could go back?"
"No." He smiled. "I sort of like where we are right now. Willow?" He
paused. "Willow?"
With a laugh, he pulled her back placed her against the pillows, pulling
the
covers up over him. Letting her stay in that position on his thighs was
just...
Too big of a temptation.
* * * * * * *
She woke in the morning with a large yawn, her mouth feeling like cotton
and
tasting like dirty socks. She blinked a couple of times, holding her head
in
her hands, and slowly roused herself enough to crawl out of bed, where she
smelled the promising aroma of coffee.
Not just coffee, she amended when she reached the kitchen. Eggs, too. And
pancakes and home-style potatoes. She looked at Xander, who was seated at
the table drinking his coffee, in wonder. "Wow."
He glanced up, a little startled, and then grinned easily. "Yeah. Thanks,
I
guess."
"When did you...? How did you....?"
"When you're single and living alone, you sort of have to learn how to cook,"
he explained. "Unless you want to live on take-out for the rest of your
life. ...Not that I would have any problem with that, personally, but it
gets a little expensive." He stood and hugged her. "Something I should have
done last night. I thought you weren't getting in for another month!"
She hugged him back. "Change of plans. Paris is great, but after a few
months I got to missing... Well, you. And then Sara, the Wiccan woman who
was teaching me? She fell in love and moved to Italy to be with him inside
of a week. So I stayed for another week and then couldn't stand it anymore.
How's everyone?"
He let go of her and turned to the counter, where he began filling her plate
up with food. "Buffy's fine. She's out of town for another two weeks; some
sort of big secret rendezvous with Angel that she thinks neither Giles or
I
know about. She wrote you about the soul thing?"
"Yeah, I heard." Willow took her plate and sat down with a grateful smile
as
he poured her a cup of coffee. "That's a big one. The Powers That Be
stepped right in and gave it to him forever?"
"Yup." Xander handed her the cup and sat down across from her. "She keeps
denying that she's sleeping with him, says that really-- she's over him now.
But she keeps going down to LA to 'go shopping,' or 'visit her father.'"
"How do you know that's not really what she's doing?" Willow asked, her
mouth full.
"Because when we need her, if something comes up, we call Angel's and she's
there," he grinned. "And then she comes home with hickeys."
"Hickeys?"
"I always told you he had an oral fixation," Xander said with a straight
face.
"Xander!" Willow laughed, wiping at her mouth.
"Will?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you remember any of what you said to me last night, when you were
horribly blitzed?" he asked with a small smile.
She rolled her eyes, her voice full of regret. "I'm so sorry about that.
I
got a little tipsy on the plane and then, when I was waiting for the bus
here, I went to this little bar across the street from the station. And I
sort of... You know those little liquor bottles they give you on the plane?"
He nodded. "Well, I had some of those on the way home. I was so happy to
be
home, you wouldn't believe it. I ended up walking all the way here from the
bus station."
"You walked all the way here while you were drunk?!"
"Yeah." She winced.
"In the dark?!"
"Yeah..."
"Willow, you could have been killed! Damn it, what were you thinking!" he
demanded, fear in his eyes.
She shook her head, placing her hands over his. "I wasn't. I'm sorry. I
won't do it again." She saw him calm down, and then pulled her hands slowly
away and began to eat again. "Now, what were you saying I said last night?
I only remember pieces of it. ...Thanks for rubbing my feet, by the way.
How did you know that I wanted a foot rub?"
"You threw your feet in my lap." He sighed, deciding not to be angry with
her. Hell, he couldn't even find it in himself to be a little bit... miffed.
"You were talking about the park, how you missed... Stuff like that."
"Oh, uh huh." She bobbed her head. "I remember that."
"Well let's go today," he said quietly.
"Don't you have work?"
"I already called in sick," he grinned. "So come on and finish and get
dressed."
Their eyes locked for a long moment, hazel on green, and then a smile
blossomed on her face. "Aye, aye, captain."
* * * * * * * * *
They walked through the park for a long time without speaking. At moments
the silence was simply comfortable, the silence of friends who had known
each
other too long to need to pretend with words. And at other moments, it was
hesitant, almost as if each of them were waiting for the other to speak.
Xander reached over as they walked and took her hand in his, smiling at the
softness of her skin. How many things had there been that he had never
noticed? Her hair shined in the sunlight and smelled citrus-y.
Another one of those hesitant moments came when they neared the playground,
their old stomping ground when they were children. He led her over to the
merry-go-round, and without speaking, they both took off their shoes, sliding
their bare feet into the warm sand. They both sat and looked at each other.
"Your hair smells good," Xander finally said.
Willow smiled. "Xander... You know that you're my best friend, right? I
mean, as *much* as I love Buffy and Giles and even Cordelia and Angel-- and
I
do-- you know that you're my *very best* friend....?"
"Of course." He returned her smile. "And you're mine."
"And you know that I would never *ever* do anything to jeopardize that,
right?" she asked softly, holding his hand a bit tighter as they pushed their
feet in the ground to make the merry-go-round swirl gently.
His smile fell a little bit. "I wouldn't either."
"Well, I was thinking..." Willow sucked in her breath and swallowed, looking
him in the eye. "What if there was something that neither of us talked
about, that we both thought maybe would ruin our friendship, but really
wouldn't?"
"Then I'd say we should talk about it," he said slowly, his heart pounding.
Willow nodded and broke eye contact with him, staring out over to the
swing-set. For a while she fell silent once more, dragging her feet in the
sand, and then she spoke again. "I love Paris," she said wistfully.
Xander closed his eyes, hearing the change in subject. "We all figured you
would. Did you learn a lot?"
"Yeah. A lot about magick, a lot about myself. A lot of things about my
mind, things I didn't know before."
"About your mind?" he repeated, confused.
"About the things that were always on the surface of my mind, things that
used to be all I thought about..." She paused. "Things that I had stopped
thinking about. Things I had stopped hoping for, because I didn't think they
could happen anymore. Things that were sort of hidden away, in the corner
of
my mind."
"Like what?" His heart began pounding again.
"I thought about the things I used to think about when it was just you and
me," she said simply. "I thought about... I thought about you a lot."
He swallowed. "I thought about you, too."
"I missed you, Xander."
"Same here," he said, his voice grainy. "Every day, I missed you."
"Those things, you know... The things that you put into the corner of your
mind... You never really forget them," she said wisely, her eyes still on
the
drifting swings. "You never really lose sight of them, though sometimes it
looks like you have. But they're just as important to you as they always
were before, you just sort of... forgot their importance, you know?"
He nodded.
"And the thing that was in the corner of *my* mind was you, Xander," she
admitted, her voice barely a breath on the wind. "Your smile, your laugh,
your eyes... The way you knew everything about me and vice versa. And there
you were, hidden away because I was too scared to look at you for a long
time. After..."
"What happened our senior year," he finished for her.
Willow looked at him in surprise, then smiled. "Yes. After that, it didn't
seem right to... love you anymore, so I tried to stop, and I put you away.
And then college happened and there was too much going on to really...
reflect on the things that people need to reflect on and then I left. And
Paris..." She sighed. "Paris gives you a lot of time and places to reflect.
So I did. And I thought about you."
Xander's jaw was locked, and he didn't look at her.
She bit her lip, wondering if she had said too much, and gazed up at him
through her lashes. "Xander? Should I have... Should I not have...?"
When he finally did speak, his voice was rough with emotion. "Sunnydale is
no Paris, I'd bet, but I thought about you too." He shook his head, not
believing that the words were, for once, coming so simply. "I love you,
Willow."
Her lower lip trembled, and she nodded slowly as a tear spilled from her
eye.
Xander glanced at her, at the tear that was tracking down her cheek, and
leaned forward, kissing it, tasting the salt of tears on skin. "I love you,
too," she whispered.
He nodded back, and caught her mouth with his, sweetness and passion
mingling, friendship flaring into something new and better and somehow still
the same, and comfortable, and right. His tongue played with hers gently
and
he held her jaw lightly in his fingers. Willow sighed against him, a tremble
flowing through her, and pulled him closer.
They broke apart and their eyes met for a long moment. Xander could see
himself mirrored there, and Willow could see herself in his eyes. They liked
what was presented there, and slowly looked away.
They watched the swings slowly float, aided by the soft wind, and they each
smiled, knowing that the secrets hidden in the corner of their minds would
no
longer be secret.
Because they no longer needed to be.
The End