Testing the Limits
By Ash (ash_j66@hotmail.com)
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Part Five
Willow tried to put the phone down with fingers that shook; the plastic receiver slipped from her unsteady grasp and fell to dangle beside the table.
"Willow?" Buffy's tone was concerned. Willow could feel her friend staring at her back; knew that Buffy's normally sparkling eyes were probably dark with worry. She knew she should say something to reassure her, make up some excuse for the abrupt termination of the last call... But she couldn't speak. Couldn't speak, couldn't move couldn't breathe.
She stared at the phone with unblinking eyes, feeling the tightness coil inside her chest. As if from a distance she heard the magazine fall to the floor and soft footsteps move quickly across the carpet to stand behind her. "Are you all right?"
< Calm calm. I have to be calm now or she'll know. She'll know something's wrong and then she'll be insistent and I don't think I could handle insistent right now. I mean I just effectively killed someone and he's never going to see his family again because I couldn't play by the rules never again no not ever and he'll probably rise tomorrow and kill more people and they'll all be my fault too because I just couldn't do what he told me so he's probably going to go kill Oz now and that'll be my fault and I don't think I could tell her, she'd hate me how could she not I let someone *die*- >
Willow's mounting hysteria was cut off when Buffy's hand fell on her shoulder. "Willow?"
It was just a gentle touch; the almost-unfelt pressure of Buffy's hand against the cotton of Willow's tank top and the smooth skin of her shoulder. It was just the touch of warm flesh against skin that spent every moment helplessly locked in the sensory replay of icy fingers smoothing over it in predatory possession. Just a gesture of support given unknowingly to someone trying to solve an impossible riddle, where the question was not *will* anyone die, but *who* will die first. It was just an unspoken offer of help to someone watching their life marching inexorably into the darkness ahead; looking ahead to years measured in blood, obedience and pain.
It was just too much to bear.
Willow turned to face Buffy, arms wrapping around her stomach as if to shield herself from a blow. Her eyes were dry but pressed almost closed with the weight of pain and guilt and the sound that came from her would have been a sob if she had been able to get enough air to her lungs to cry. She breathed in great gulps, slender frame shaking.
Buffy was caught by surprise when the redhead's knees crumpled under her and even with Slayer reflexes she barely managed to catch Willow before she hit the ground. Willow hung like a dead weight in her arms while Buffy lowered her gently to the carpet. "Willow! What's wrong?"
Willow pulled herself up into a sitting position, pushing backwards until she thumped against the wall. Fear sang through her blood before settling in her throat with leaden permanence, her lips twisting in a vain effort at speech. Frustrated, Willow shook her head soundlessly; drawing her knees up to her chest and hugging them to her like a security blanket.
Buffy dropped to her knees, staring at her shaking friend. This was new and alarming. She'd never seen Willow lose control like this. Deceptively soft arms folded around Willow's body, hugging her close as the Slayer whispered meaningless words of comfort.
Willow's only response was to lean forward and bury her face in Buffy's shoulder as she continued to tremble. Her arms remained locked around her knees with white-knuckled desperation.
"It's okay... It's okay." The whispered monologue went on, a hopefully soothing background noise as Buffy hugged her friend closer, one hand stroking Willow's head with baffled sympathy and frustrated energy.
Willow raised her face off Buffy's shoulder, green eyes shining through a haze of unshed tears. When she spoke it was a rasp of grief that clawed its way up through a throat clogged with regret. Her words were punctuated with brief pauses as she fought for air.
"NO! It'll... never be... okay. Never!" The last word barely made it out before the sobs started: deep, wrenching expulsions of breath and tears. Buffy held her tighter, trying to convey with the strength of her body that it would be all right, that *she* would make it all right.
Buffy closed her eyes, leaning her cheek against soft red hair and silently promising the shaking girl in her arms that she would do anything it took to help her; anything it took to make it all better.
Willow felt the promise hanging in the air and cried harder, knowing that it was a lie.
Willow cried as her throat closed up with pain and her nails dug into the soft flesh of her legs leaving little half-moons of blood. She cried for the parents out there somewhere who would soon start wondering where their son was; she cried because the girl who held her was both her only comfort and another chain around her neck, another bargaining chip.
She cried because she could never make it all go away now; she could never pretend this whole thing hadn't happened now; she could never forget now.
Never.
It'd never be all right again.
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