“Enemies” 1/14 – New story/old story

[sroni]

 
I did it. I finished fixing “Enemies”. Oh, it’ll probably go through other edits, but for the most part, it has the scenes added in that I needed.

And now I’m posting it here, in chaptered segments.

Just as a reminder, this was originally written as a Christmas present for nemo_gravis, bastardsnow, and the great and wonderful aadler, for all the help they’ve given me over the years. (Most especially to aadler. And you can blame him for the fact that I write, and subject you to it; he’s the one who taught me how.)

Enemies

Enemies. That was what they had been ever since he had stupidly deluded himself into believing they “had a connection” and had gone over to speak to her, to comfort her. Hah. She didn’t want comfort. He had found himself flipped onto his back with her on top of him (for the second time); her hands encircling his throat (okay, that hadn’t happened before), her voice laughing and mocking him. He locked that memory away for years, and it only came out in nightmares. She was the reason he couldn’t stand to have someone touch his neck. She was the reason that he was never sure if he would wake up in the same bed he started out in. She was the reason that he owed Angel his life.

Years later, when he finally dredged the memory out and really looked at it, it wasn’t her laugh got to him.

It was her eyes.

Her eyes weren’t laughing at him. They were begging him for help. She never begged for anything, but she’d been begging that time. And he hadn’t noticed. Him, the one who was supposed to be able to see.

Nice to have one more thing he could say he screwed up.

It was getting to be a really long list.

When he had found out that she was in prison, he’d decided that she was where she belonged. Then, when he’d gotten really drunk, and as a result, really honest with himself, he realized that she was there voluntarily, because if she didn’t want to be there, no way in hell would any normal prison be able to hold her. Which meant that she’d changed. She had changed enough to be willing to stay in prison, and that meant that maybe she didn’t belong there anymore. He’d immediately shoved that thought out of his head, because he’d been petty and selfish and didn’t want to admit that she could have changed.

It was easier to hate her.

Guess what? When she busted out of jail to help a fight that wasn’t hers, he respected her. When she showed up in Sunnydale to fight and train, the changes she’d gone through were shoved in his face. At first, she held him at arm’s length, and he was perfectly okay with that. He didn’t want to get close to her.

It was easier to hate her.

Then he lost his eye, and … things changed. She wouldn’t let him out of her sight. When Caleb gave him the fun and wonderful gift of no depth perception, she put her own life on the back burner to help look after him. She had gone even more into protect-mode than Buffy and Willow, which was saying a big something. Well, about Willow at least. Buffy suddenly got swamped by all her responsibilities.

He got it.

He was a walking reminder of how she’d failed. How she hadn’t been good enough.

Faith hauled a cot into his hospital room and slept there, since she wasn’t on patrol duty. Giles agreed that Buffy and Willow could do without her on patrol most nights, but was a little surprised that it was Faith, and not Buffy or Willow asking. Giles loved Buffy like a daughter, and as such, didn’t want to accept her emotional faults.

Faith was the one who was there when he had the nightmares. During that time, they somehow became friends, in spite of the badness that happened.

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