“It’s too much,” Buffy murmured through her tears.
“What is, sweetheart?”
“This. All of this.”
“Can you specify?”
“What we’re doing…it’s too much.”
“What do you want to do?”
She sighed, trembling. “I think it might be best if I go back to the mansion.”
His grip on her tightened and he had to talk himself into loosening it. “Pet. . . Do you really want to do that or is it just something you think is best because you’re scared?”
She crawled out of the bed and stared down at him as he sat up. He hated seeing her tears and he ached to comfort her.
“Why do you do that? Why do you ask me questions like that? I hate questions like that! Why do I have to say how I feel—“ she demanded. William felt a rant coming on, and he jumped in to stop her.
“Wait a minute there,” he said, crawling out of the bed and standing on the opposite side, facing her. “I’m not making you tell me anything—“
“Yes! You are. You ask these questions that always have a double meaning – it’s like you want to crawl in my head and psychoanalyze me.”
“I don’t want to – okay, I can see how it seems that way, but Buffy, all I want to do is understand you. I want to—“
“So help me if you tell me again how you want to help me. I don’t need help. I need for you to . . . to. . . “
“To what?”
“I don’t know, but I wish you’d stop asking me all the damn time!”
“Then bloody tell me what you feel, what you want and what you need or I can’t fucking help you!” William shouted, throwing up his arms and starting to pace. He looked at her, “You want to know why I ask you what you feel? Because you . . . you’re like a robot—“
“Gee, thanks. That supposed to make me feel better?”
“No. It’s supposed to make you see what happens when I try to talk to you about certain things.”
“Like sex? How do I feel about sex? I feel pretty much terrified of it, William. I’ve never done it before as you know now. I don’t have a single fucking clue what I’m doing and I feel like a bumbling idiot with all that I am doing.”
“I assure you, you’re not. Everything you’ve done has been perfect.”
“And then that’s not enough. Then you come at me telling me how you care for me, and you hint at the depth of that caring and . . . and when I kiss you and you touch me, I . . . I . . . “
He wanted to prompt her. He wanted to ask her “What?” but he didn’t want to pressure her. He had to give her the space she needed here; he had a feeling she was about to blow, and that maybe this time, he would get some answers.
“I feel all these things!” she exclaimed finally. “And I . . . I don’t know what to do with them and I don’t know what they are. Only the crap you read in romance novels but who really believes that stuff? And then I find myself feeling them and . . . and I’m not stupid William. I know what it feels like to be aroused and to want someone, and when you touch me. . . “She shook her head and sighed. “When you touch me, I come undone.”
“When I touch you,” he began hesitantly, “Does your heart race?”
“Yes,” she admitted running a hand through her hair.
“Your toes curl?”
“Yes.”
“Does your skin hum?”
“Yes.”
“Buffy, that’s normal. That’s what’s supposed to happen.”
“Except…except I don’t know if I’m staying and . . . and while I feel all those things, I feel like it’s all those things and then some and . . . “she broke off, looking away.
“And that’s what frightens you.”
She nodded numbly, still not looking at him. “What do you want from me, William?” she asked softly, so softly he barely heard her.
Taking a deep breath, he said, “I want you to be happy, Buffy.”
She looked at him, “That’s it? Just to be happy? So if I was happy back in the States, you’d be fine with that as long as I was happy?”
“Honestly?”
“Please.”
“No. I mean, I’d be happy to know that you weren’t miserable, but I’d be happier if you were with me and happy. I want to make you happy. I want you to. . . I want you to stay here and I want you to open yourself up to me—“
“What if I can’t?” she whispered. “What if I’m broken?”
“Oh Buffy, you’re not broken,” he said passionately, and came over to her, taking her hands in his. She yanked them back and he sighed and took a step back. Space, she needed space.
“You’re not broken,” he continued, “Because you feel those things. If you were broken, you wouldn’t feel them at all. You’re afraid of them is all. Buffy, you have a soft place to land here, I told you this already, you can tell me; you can talk to me. I won’t push you for anything—“
She gave him a disbelieving look.
He nodded, “Okay, yes, it seems that I’ve been unable to keep my hands to myself. I –I – God, Buffy, you make me crazy—“
“Thanks a lot!”
“Let me finish. You drive me crazy with wanting you. Buffy, I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want you.”
She looked up at him, “Fred?”
He flinched slightly at that and shook his head.
She inhaled audibly. “Oh.”
“I find it hard to keep my hands to myself where you’re concerned and I thought that you liked it when I touch you—“
“I do! But it . . . I feel like I’m on overload. Like all my senses are on overload and I’m going to combust.”
He smirked, “It’s the same for me.”
“It is?”
“Yes.”
“How do you handle it?”
William smiled. “I understand where it’s coming from and why. Not to say it’s not scary, it’s scary as hell still, but I know…I just know that the payoff is worth is. You’re worth it. Being loved and loving in return is worth it.”
She looked away again, sticking her hand in front of her mouth and chewing on a nail. “I’m scared,” she finally said after a long while.
“I know.”
“No, you don’t know. Try being told all your life how your emotions are silly. Try being told that emotions are silly things that only get in the way of logical, rational thought and that emotions cannot get you ahead, they only make you silly.”
William’s fists clenched. Damn, but her parents had really done a number on her. He couldn’t imagine living in a house where emotions were thought of as silly things and simple things a child needs, like love and affection, were instead hard to come by and something they lost their faith in. He’d never wanted to pummel someone as hard as he wanted to pummel her parents. And he never wanted to protect and love someone as much as he wanted to protect and love Buffy. It broke his heart to hear all that she’d been through, all that she’d had to live.
“Do you think my emotions for you are silly? Do you think it’s silly of me to be falling in – to care for you as I do?” he asked her quietly.
“How can you care for me William? How? I am like a robot. I’m closed off, I’ve never had sex, I make things so hard for you -- how can you care for me? It doesn’t make sense.”
He smiled wanly, “Love isn’t something that is supposed to make much sense, Buffy. You can’t help you fall for. You can’t control those things, and just because you can’t point to a specific reason, does not mean it’s not real. You can’t see love, you can’t touch it physically, but it exists. Yeah, love makes people do crazy things, but in the end…it’s the only thing worth living for. Without it, you’re just dying alone. Who wants that?”
“William, are you saying you --?”
“What do you think?” he asked imploringly.
She fell silent and it was like he could see her retreating within herself. Dammit!
“William, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” she said honestly. “I don’t know if I’m staying or not. I just don’t know.”
“I know.”
“I wish you’d stop making plans for me as if I were.”
“I apologize for that, okay? But how can you know if you’d like to stay if you don’t see what options you have here?”
She nodded slowly, “I will give you that. You have a valid point.”
“Thank you.”
“If you don’t mind, I think I’d like it if you could take me to the mansion tonight.”
“Buffy—“he sighed.
“If I’m going to discover my options, then I have to discover those options at the mansion, not here with you. That place would technically be my home.”
She had a point as well, but it didn’t mean he wanted to let her go. He nodded, “Fine.”
“Thank you.”
“Do you . . . Do you want me to stay a few days with you?”
She smiled, not a large, amused smile, but a soft smile that suggested he was incorrigible. “No. But I’ll make you a deal.”
“Yes?”
“If I need you, I’ll call you.”
He had to take what he could get it seemed. Nodding resolutely, he stuck out his hand. “Deal.”
“Deal,” she agreed, and shook his hand firmly.