When the pair arrived at William’s home, Buffy requested a shower to “clean off the hospital yuckiness”, and William gave her one of his black t-shirts to wear as a night dress. While in the shower, William threw her clothes in the wash and pondered all that had happened that night, and then his mind reached back to all that had happened from the moment he met his Buffy.
When Buffy emerged from the shower, toweling her hair and looking out of this world sexy in his t-shirt, she found a pensive William sitting on his bed, waiting for her.
“I think the warm water helped my back,” she told him, not sure how to maneuver around the thoughtful and almost forlorn looking William. “I think I’ll just take one of those nifty pills after I brush my hair and –“
“Buffy.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry.”
She blinked, “Huh? What?” Her heart filled with dread. Oh, God. Was this it? Was this when he told her he’d had enough? Had the idea of her somewhat submitting to him given him pause and he realized that he actually didn’t want her anymore? She clutched the towel in her hand, bracing herself, and thinking she’d just call a cab and have it take her back to the mansion—
“I’ve been so unfair to you.”
“How?” she managed to choke out.
“Thinking back, I didn’t help matters when it came to confusing sex and love.”
“Excuse me?”
He looked up at her and concern filled his expression. “What’s wrong? Are you all right?”
“I – I just – Are you done with me now?”
He was up off the bed in a flash. “What?”
“It sounded like you were . . . you know…dumping me.”
He shook his head adamantly and rushed to her, drawing her in his arms. “No, no, Buffy. Why would you ever think that?”
“You sounded like you had regrets,” she couldn’t keep the whimper out of her voice.
“I do have regrets, but not about loving you and wanting to be with you.”
She let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding and tears of relief dropped from her green eyes.
“You know I love you, why would you think something like that?” he demanded softly, wiping her tears away gently with the pads of his thumbs.
“It doesn’t mean that all my insecurities just vanish in a snap, Will.”
“Then we’ll just have to work on that won’t we?”
“I’m . . . it’s not gonna be easy.”
“I haven’t helped,” he muttered.
“What do you mean?” she asked, inquisitively, looking up him.
“From the start of our relationship, Buffy, I figured out that I could make you putty in my hands by touching you and kissing you.” He shook his head, disgusted with himself. “I thought if I kept right on touching you and making you want me, you’d fall for me. All the while, I never told you that what I was doing, I did out of love.”
“Well, I didn’t exactly make it easy for you in that department. You mentioned the word ‘love’ and I was ready to bolt.”
“I shouldn’t have given up on telling you. I shouldn’t have used my body to love you without letting you know what intent was behind it. You though it was all I wanted from you and you already thought it was all you could give me—“
“Will—“
“I had a hand in it, Buffy. You were a novice to love and sex and I tried to use sex to make you love me, or at least make you see that I loved you…how were you supposed to know the difference?”
“Will, I had just as much a hand in all of that as you did.”
“I didn’t help though.”
“Will, stop.”
“No, I don’t want to stop. I want you to know how sorry I am.”
“Okay,” she said on a sigh.
He led her to the bed and he held her on his lap, making sure she was comfortable. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he murmured, “And I should have told you about Dru.”
“Will, honestly—“
“No, Buffy. Part of being in a relationship is owning up to your own mistakes. I should have told you about Dru. I couldn’t have expected you to react any differently to finding out something like that. Anyone would. I never told you how I felt, and I never laid it out on the line for you. I’m sorry, Buffy. Please forgive me.”
“Will, I think we’ve both made mistakes and coupled with my own neurosis, things got out of hand.”
“Buffy, I’m going to make you a promise.”
“Okay,” she said slowly.
“Every day, I’m going to tell you how much I love you. Every single day. And in the future, when we start making love again, I’m going to tell you I love you. Every single time so there is no doubt that I do love you.”
She sighed, “Will…”
“What?”
“You’ve done a lot for me. You’ve pretty much kept me together so far by not giving up on me—“
“And I’ll continue to do that.”
“But I don’t want you to have that responsibility of keeping me together. That’s not what I want this to be about. It’d be so easy for me to fall into your arms and say ‘fix me, hold me together’, but that’s not the way I want it. You’ve taught me a lot of things, and I’ve started to discover a lot of things. You’ve given me strength, and you’ve given me hope, you’ve shown me the other side. I’ve always taken care of myself in the most fundamental ways: Roof over my head, money, clothing, food – and I’ve ignored all the other stuff. You’ve helped me to see that other stuff is just as important, if not more, than the fundamentals.
Over the past few days, with the ghosts and all, I’ve discovered this strength and determination inside me that I didn’t know I had. I want to build on that, I want to be a whole person, not a half a person and I don’t want it to be your responsibility to keep me whole and sane. I’ve been thinking that with the wealth of crap I’ve got muddled in my brain due to the programming I received from my parents, and then carried on myself, I think I need some professional help. I used to balk at such an idea, even when Dru would suggest it, but I see now that I need it. The whole talk of suicide and the fact that Dru saw it…it scared me that I could see it too. It scared me that I almost welcomed it. You have given me so much, Will. You’ve shown me how to live and I beat the crap out of it for a while there and I just…I don’t want to do that anymore. I’m so tired of taking crap and just letting it eat at me. I’m so tired of pretending to be strong when I’m really just falling apart inside and not handling anything very well at all. I don’t know, just something inside me snapped when I saw those samples shredded. I didn’t want to lie down and give up. I wanted to fight. I wanted to fight the ghosts, I wanted to fight Edina for making things so difficult, I wanted to fight my parents for what they did, I wanted to fight you for making me fall for you and face my demons, and I wanted to fight myself for taking all the good I had, and could have had, and shoving it away from me.
I’m still afraid of so much, Will, but I’m so tired of being that way. Of living that way. I want to learn to not be afraid. I don’t want to have those moments of fear grip me just because you want to have a serious chat with me. I want to feel whole, and you’ve given me that gift, Will, that desire to want to try.”
She was surprised to see tears in his eyes. “Will?”
He hugged her tight to him, burying his face in her neck. “That’s the best thing I ever heard you say, Buffy. I’ve been so worried about you—“
“I know you have. If it makes you feel any better, I’ve been worried about me too. And you. I’m so sorry that I hurt you so many times. I’m sorry I made you feel used.”
He pulled back, and kissed her softly, pressing his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. “Buffy…”
“Yes?”
“I’m pretty sure you told me you fell for me in there.”
She smiled, “Caught that did you?”
His eyes popped open and a wealth of love poured forth from those baby blues. “You don’t even know…you’ve given me so much too, Buffy. You took me out of a life of mediocrity and gave me something to fight for again. I went from going through the motions, to having a whole new world open up to me. Dru might have got us together, but it was us that did the rest. You believe that, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“How do you feel, baby, hmmm? How’s your back?”
“It’s okay,” she yawned. “I want a pill though.”
“Druggie,” he teased.
She grinned. “Yep!”
“Buffy, one thing…it sounds like you’ve made the decision to stay…?”
She smiled, “Sure does sound like that, doesn’t it?”
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