Take her please.

Okay first of all, let me say this – Yes I have been away forever. I fell in love. Fell out of love. Fell in love… yada yada yada. I really tried to finish This Little Girl, but the ending ended up being too squirrely, so I pretty much left it like it was. I should have probably taken the TBC off the last chapter though.

That being said, I am a Buffy/Faith fanatic. Always have been. And I like fics with kids, so sue me. If you like it – let me know. If you don’t – well let me know too (but at least be nice about it.) I am a teacher and so I am not going to be able to update everyday. But I will update. Bear with me, as this fic – well, who the hell knows where it is going. Anyway, hope you like it.

I already put the disclaimer in – I don’t own any of these characters (except the ones I made up!). If I did, do you honestly think I would still be teaching school.

I have no idea what this will be rated but I went with Adult+ whatever the heck that means. I’ll change it if I have to.

Enjoy reading. – Review if you want – I am still a review whore that way.

(Also, ignore my grammatical errors, I am an English teacher who is not on the clock.)

Chapter 1

I didn’t think I had ever seen something so sad. And come on, that was saying a lot. I didn’t know though, I suppose with Faith that act of bravado, that fear of being seen as weak – it made it so much sadder than all those countless others. She just had to be so damn tough. And the whole thing hurt me really. I mean, why her? Was there really Someone up there? Someone who chose what and how much we lowly human beings could take? Here Faith – have a doped up mom. And here – here’s an abusive stepfather. What, your real father? Well We can’t help you there. You wanna eat? – You’ve got to work for it. But hey, We’ll make you a slayer. Not the number one slayer, mind you, and We are going to kill your watcher, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers, right?

Things were not so much handed to Faith, as they were sort of thrust at her. So how did one deal with that sort of hand? She lashed out. She acted out. She rebeled. She defied all rules and logic, because all rules and logic had defied her. She became the antithesis. The antithesis of me. And what about me, huh? What did I, the Chosen One, do? I ignored her. I ridiculed her. I hated her. Well, okay, that one was not actually true. Not by a long shot. But they say perception is like ninety percent of reality, right? Or hell, something like that.

When we finally got to Cleveland, she fled. Just like the good ole Faith. At first I thought she was acting all wiggy because of Robin, because of what happened to him in LA. And maybe that had something to do with it, but not for the reason I thought. But of course I didn’t find that out until after she was gone. So much of Faith would come out in her absence. Mostly though, I would learn how utterly stupid I sometimes was. But could you really blame me? I mean not anymore than I could blame myself that is. But really, who ever really knew Faith? I never had any idea what she was thinking. And just when I thought I had figured her out…BOOM…something else would happen to blow my speculations right out of the water. If I were granted that one faithful wish, I wouldn’t ask for money or anything like that (I mean come on – who hasn’t read the “Monkey’s Paw” for god’s sake). No, I would ask to get inside her head, just for a moment or two. Just to see what she was thinking, to see if I was ever right about any of it. Unfortunately no monkey’s paw or magic genie had ever shown up on my doorstep – and if it did, I would probably have slayed it first and asked questions later. Old habits die hard, and all.

Where was I? I tend to ramble, if you hadn’t noticed. But all of this, it was so confusing and I was finally just tired. Tired of everything. And I guess that started in Cleveland. Let’s be honest though – those were stressful days. Confusing. And we were all coping or at least trying to cope. Myself included. Plus…Cleveland sucked. No offense to all you Clevelanders (or whatever you call yourselves) but hellmouth or no, there was no way in hell I was staying in that city. I wanted sunshine. And warmth. I wanted the beach. And a nice frozen drink now and then. Hell, I had earned that, hadn’t I? And they had all of that in Florida. It was a lot like California in that way. Except not really. (Yes, I know I astound you with my wonderful eye for detail. But you know what, you can kiss my ass). Anyway, I liked it. And the gang liked it. So what started out as a vacation from Cleveland (a vacation from the place where Faith left me) ended with us moving – Miami. An eclectic city to say the least.

But again, back to Cleveland. I remember everything about that day. The day after she left, I mean. I found the letter on my pillow. How had I not heard her come in? Why the hell was I finally sleeping like the dead? And the one time I should be alert? (Seems fate had it in for me sometimes too.)

Dear Buffy,
I’ve never really been good at this letter writing shit. Ha! I bet you didn’t even know I could write. Okay, I am being a little hard on you there. I know you don’t think I am stupid or anything. But where to begin? Damn, this is harder than I thought.

I hate Cleveland. I know you do too. But if I’m going to spend my time in another cold place, I might as well hightail it back to Boston. I have so much to say to you, B. I could probably spend the next five hours filling something like fifty pages if I thought for a second you would have the attention span to read it. (See we are alike in some ways.)

First of all though, I am not leaving to be difficult. It’s just… well, some things have happened. And consequences have inevitably caught up with me. Again. Not to be a downer or anything, but I don’t know what the hell I expected. But, I digress. My colossal fuck-ups are not surprising, especially to you. And so I am doing the one thing I am good at – running. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be able to outrun anything this time, but it’s my shit to deal with. You have enough.

And I just can’t deal. I really thought I could. I hoped I could. I felt like just being around you would be enough. But I was so wrong there. So incredibly wrong. I suppose I could sit here and just wax poetics about undying love, yin and yang, and all that shit. Tell you how I really feel. Like you don’t know. Like you haven’t always known.

Anyway, this is getting too long to poignant. I’ll miss you B. You mean the world to me. You always have.

F

And that was it. She was gone. Forever. Or so I thought. And the pain it was too real. Too real to stay in Cleveland. But that came later. At first, well… I couldn’t even get out of bed. The gang thought a vacation would do me good. And what do you know? I actually liked Florida. It had the one thing I was looking for – no memories of Faith.