Afterthoughts - Amends

It was five am, Christmas Day, 1998. Xander Harris was asleep in his 
backyard, two inches of snow around and on top of him. He startled 
awake, and screamed at what he saw. He glanced at his house. Through the 
steamed up windows he could see his family smashing into things and 
dancing in their usual drunken way. He sat up and dusted the snow off of 
his face. "Wonderful. They're sleeping through what must be like, the 
first snowfall ever in Sunnydale." He looked at his watch, and after 
seeing the time, acknowledged that his family's hell-on-wheels 
celebrating had run later than usual this year. He laid back down, 
snuggling as tightly into his sleeping bag as he could. He was freezing, 
but there was no getting warm in the snow when you're covered in it. He 
sighed and opened up his thermos. His hot chocolate wasn't frozen, but 
it wasn't very hot either. He drank it anyways, and noticed he'd brought 
his backpack outside with him. "I bet it's soaked inside," he remarked, 
taking a hold of it and unzipping it. The outside was a bit damp but the 
contents were fine. He pulled a notebook he'd written "History. This 
sucks." on its cover and a pen. The book had nothing to do with history, 
of course. It was his journal. 
"Christmas Day. 1998. This only comes once a year, and this year is no 
different than any others, so far. I'm outside, all alone, freezing my 
ass off. Oh yeah, there's one difference. 
SNOW! 
Like three inches or somethin. I don't know, I don't have a ruler out 
here. I wonder how many centimeters it is. I wonder how many centimeters 
are in an inch? I gotta remember to make good use of my time with Giles 
in the library. 
You know something that hasn't changed? 
I'm alone. 
There's like not a moment that I don't think about them. 
Them! I'm disgusting. I'm not sitting here daydreaming about one girl. 
I'm dreaming of two. 
Not together though. Ew ew ew. Wait, what kind of guy am I????? 
I just..... 
I can't even explain how I feel about Willow. She's just......Willow. 
This is gonna sound really corny, but she's like no longer the tomboy 
who used to comb my hair and help me melt the feet off my GI Joes. She's 
like....a girl. A girl who wears skirts and lipstick and makes my heart 
pitter patter and my knees go weak and-- 
NO!!! I cannot believe I just said all that. 
I knew journals were a bad idea. Cordelia was right. 
Cordelia was right?!?!? Did I just say that? Must be the snow. I'm going 
back to sleep. The ground's not that wet....." 
Buffy laid in Angel's arms. They'd spent the night together in his bed, 
just holding each other. Every now and then she'd looked back at him, 
wondering what he was thinking, what he was feeling. He seemed to be so 
unsure of himself, or of her. She wondered what would happen if she were 
to kiss him, and what would happen if they did more. 
She shuddered at that thought. She remembered what had happened the 
first time. But could that really happen again? Could the curse still 
remain? 
Something in her soul told her that there was no way, that they could 
make love all night if they wanted to, nothing would change. He wasn't 
human, or a vampire, really, so the curse couldn't apply. 
And something in her head told her just the opposite. 

Take me Back