I had to stop by before I left. I mean, I wasn't abandoning everyone

*like Buffy*

and I wasn't leaving without a trace. They all knew I had to do some soul searching, some Jack Kerouac exploring. Well, they knew I had to do some exploring. The Kerouac part would have been a shock, because none of them are aware that I can actually read.

But exploring or no, there are some things I didn't want to leave unfinished. God knows I've done that enough, ol' Xander-Jump-Da-Gun, dropping one good thing the moment something a bit more

*red headed*

interesting comes along. And only when I am alone... fuck, I'm always alone.

Maybe that's why I couldn't go off into the Great Somewhere without seeing her. Gives me something to resolve, something to prove that I'm not the eternal bad guy, the bastard in black polyester.

But I didn't expect this. When Willow was in a coma, she looked.. I don't know, like a soap opera comatose person. Perfectly wounded. Not a bedsore on her ass. Sweet and pathetic. But this... Her hair is lank, her face still bruised though it's been a week. Her skin, dull, lacking radiance. And if her eyes were to open, I'd see

*hate? love?*

only blankness. Blank, unknowing void.

I hold her hand, and it's cold.

But I couldn't go without saying goodbye, Faith. Maybe because I tried to help you when no one else would... Maybe because you noticed me when no one else did... And though your hands were strong and my life nothing to you, though I hate you more than I thought I could hate...

I can't help but love you, too.

**

It's soft here. White on black, shadows sweeping and formless, enveloping me in a coldwarm void. Floating. Like in water but I could never swim and oh god, I'm drowning, and the faces shout out at me and fuck, this is always the way it happens, not with a scream but with a moan, and I never wanted to go away like this-

Until the hand pulls me up, warm. And I come out of whatever-that-was to see him. And his bruises are gone, and his eyes are kind, and no one has ever looked at me like that before. He says nothing, just smiles at me. And I go to him, weak, tired, needed to be where it's warm.

His hands are like fire on my skin, but I don't burn. It's like waves on the beach, filling me, fulfilling me, and I can feel my body respond. I want him. I want to ride him. I want him pounding inside of me, to dash away that cool powdery nothing that will come again. And again. And I only want to come. Again. And again. And no one wants to give me that, because I am just a bitch, an evil bitch, and no one, not even the Boss, can see past that.

But his hands are on my chest, on my stomach, rubbing and heating and giving me a way to fly. Not sex but love, and with this I am virgin again. He slides between me, slowly in, and the tension that has always made me jump on top and bounce like there's no tomorrow disappears. I only want to lay here, basking in the light. I want to become him, be in him, as he is in me. Because the sunshine was always the brightest. I know. I was never in the sunshine, never in the light, always just the one who is hidden away because I like to break hurt kill things.

I've never known this kind of gentleness.

It drifts away, and I am at peace. And the soft white-black void is nowhere near, only light surrounding me, touching me and kissing me, as I finally can sleep.

**

The monitor starts beeping. As the nurses and doctors pour in, trying to pump life back into her, they ask me whether or not she woke up before she died.

But she didn't. Just seemed to slip away.

Almost as if she was waiting for me to say goodbye.

~fin~