Rating: PG
Improv #21: Happy ending
Disclaimer: None of this is mine.
Author's Notes: Another depressing "happy ending" fic. I've decided to answer this improv twice (hopefully) so an actually *happy* happy ending will be coming, promise. I just had to get out the angst first.The song is "Calling Me Home" by Patty Griffin.
Dedication: Daddy, happy 6th anniversary. I love you.

Momma, I hear you calling tonight
your old song calling me in for the night
in the tall grass, down from the trees where I climb
when day is gone, the birds sing their last songs in the pine

When I was little I had a treehouse in our backyard. I used to spend all my time up there, writing in my diary - as soon as I learned how to write my mom gave me my first diary, a pink book with a tiny lock I could now break with one hand - drawing and pretending to be a princess. Or at least a lady in distress. I would spend hours waiting for my prince to come rescue me. I always stayed there until my mom came to the back door and called me inside.

I always pretended I didn't hear her. It was a game we played. I'd ignore her, go happily along doing what I'd been doing; singing or braiding a rope of "hair" for my prince to climb up. "Buffy!" she'd call. "Buffy Anne Summers, it's time to come inside!" Dinner's ready, she'd say, or you better clean your room, or it's getting dark or come inside and help me with the baby. I'd continue about my business until her voice got serious and then I'd poke my head out the window.

"I'm waiting for my prince to rescue me!" I'd call down. I could see her roll her eyes, even though it was usually dusky and I could barely make out her outline.

"Oh Buffy, rescue yourself!" she'd call and go back inside. So I did, with plenty of swashbuckling of course. So really it was Mom that taught me I didn't have to wait for a prince to come along. Getting superpowers helped but the basic idea was already there. Mom called me home and of course I had to go. The day was over and it was time to go inside, to warmth, to safety, to her. Mom always called when it was time to go home.

I hear your voice calling
by the back door light
it reaches as far as I roam
it's calling me all the way home

I'm higher than that treehouse now. If I look down I can barely see the ground, so far below. It's dark too; darker than it was in my backyard. Mom never let me stay out after dark. I don't look down, of course, because I don't have time. I'm talking to Dawn, and I can hear my voice saying these words, and I know they'll be my last. The knowledge is removed, as if this too is a game, a fairytale that will be over in a moment. Oh I don't really believe that, and I am not doing this as a game. I don't expect it to end, except in one way. I don't expect normal life to resume. Or any life at all. I know what I am turning toward, and yet it all seems to go so slow, not to be real life at all.

Dawn is crying, and that is real, all too real. She is the thing I will regret leaving the most, the person I will miss. When I ran away that summer I longed for my mother, for Angel . . . but for Dawn too. I never thought I would miss her, until she wasn't there with her constant invasions of my privacy and her need to be as much like me as possible without giving any indication she thought I was tolerable. Of course, I know now that I didn't really miss her then because she wasn't my sister then but . . . but the loss still aches. Will I miss her where I'm going? I can't imagine not. But it's better this way, and I know however hard this is for her, she'll make it through. We're strong, us Summers women.

That summer I used to lay awake at night, hearing my mother's voice calling me home. The way I hear it now . . .

Momma
The darkness is falling so fast
Somehow I thought the day would always last
I'm afraid that I walk alone in life
Following the sound of your voice by the light

When you're young, you don't think about death. Life is such a huge, amazing thing, spread before you. It seems endless. There's no time to think about dying, when you're a child and there's so much living to be done. No reason to think about it. I learned pretty young that there was, after all, a reason . . . Sixteen. Not that young. Older than Dawn is now. Still young though. The person I was then and the person I am now seem totally different, but we're not really. We still save the world, or die trying. We still want nothing more than to curl up in our mother's arms.

When you're young, you think your parents are invincible. Gods almost. I found out my parents were human the year I became the Slayer; it was almost too much, to find out they were people, and I wasn't, exactly. I made it through somehow, only to find that not only did they have faults, they were mortal.

I've been watching people die for years. Watching people live and die and live again. It never really hits though, the whole mortality thing. What is death? Where do they go? What happens to them? I saw it around me all the time, but it never touched me. Or it did but . . . but only me. None of the people I loved. I didn't think it could. And then one day . . . one day I learned far too much, about death and life and parents and myself. And I was alone.

One of the things I learned when I became the Slayer was that I was always alone. No, that's not quite right. I had the Scooby Gang, and they helped me, they were with me but . . . I could only rely on myself, and I did. For a long time, I did. It was my responsibility to take care of everyone else, even my friends - especially my friends - and I never needed anyone to take care of me. What I didn't know until Mom died was that that was all a lie. Because no matter what happened I always knew that when the night fell she would call me home, and I would go, and she would love me . . . I'd be safe . . . And then, suddenly, she was gone. No one was taking care of me anymore. I didn't realize I'd been protected until that protection was gone. But I still hear her voice, and I still follow it.

Your sweet voice is calling
by the back door light
It reaches as far as I roam
It's calling me all the way home
It's calling me all the way home
Calling me all the way home

I started to hear her the day she died, but quietly, when I thought I was asleep, calling to me. It wasn't time though. She was teasing, like she always used to, so I pretended I didn't hear. Her voice is serious now, louder. It's time. Time to save myself, or Dawnie, or the world. Time to go home.

I feel like I'm moving slowly, but I know I'm running. The light is getting closer, ready to surround me, but all I can see is dusk . . . it's almost night time here, better get inside, where it's safe, where it's warm . . . time for bed baby . . . but mommy, I'm not tired . . . just lay down sweetie, I'll sing to you, just close your eyes . . . close your eyes . . . time to come inside now and go to bed . . .

I've been alone so long, it feels like . . . been awake, playing this game. I'm so tired now, so tired of everything. And I miss her. I miss the way she tucked me into bed. The sound of her voice. The way she sang to me. I miss having her across the hall, knowing that she was there, keeping me safe, or letting me keep her safe. Just that she was there. I miss the way she used me as an excuse to make pancakes and bring home Ben and Jerry's. I miss . . . her. Everything about her. She told me I could rescue myself; if I was strong, it was because she made me so. After she left, it got so much harder to be that.

But it's over now. And I can see her, in the light, and hear her voice, and soon I'll be able to lay down and sleep, and she'll sing me a lullabye again . . .

Momma
The night is so long and so deep
Won't you stay a while- stay with me here 'till I sleep

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