INNOCENCE LOST
Laura Smith
I'll never forget the first time I heard her voice. I was making my way through the stacks, looking at the sadly depleted library and cataloguing, in my mind, what I would need to supplement it. I was lost in thought when I looked up and she was just standing there, a timid smile on her face.
"Er. Hello."
"Hi."
We continued to stare at each other, neither seeming sure of what to do or say next. I knew I certainly didn't. I was expecting only one person in my library and she most certainly wasn't her.
"I need a book. Which is probably easy to guess since this is the library. And that's where the books are. Most of the time. But I don't know where anything is anymore, since they've rearranged a lot of stuff and I suppose you could have done that and I think it's very nice I just don't know where I could find a copy of Theories of Geometry."
"Right this way." A sort of calm came over me as I realized she was just a student, no more capable of harming me or my purpose here than of managing to hide her nervousness. I led her to the shelves where I had moved the textbooks and handed her the one she had requested. "Is there anything else?"
She looked up at me, her eyes wide. "You're English."
"Quite."
"I mean, you have an accent, well at home you probably don't, but here you do and I keep doing the babbling thing, but it's the one thing I'm really good at, although I'm pretty good at school too and I'm not so good around boys, not that you're a boy, more like a man type person and I'm shutting up now."
I laughed softly and put my hand on her shoulders, turning her around and guiding her to the checkout counter. "What's your name."
"Willow. Willow Rosenberg."
"I'm Rupert Giles. I've just started here as librarian, as you may have guessed."
"Well, when Mr. Rothman died, we figured they'd get someone new, although I wasn't sure, since I think I was the only student who ever came in here. I actually had to tell the school he'd stopped showing up." She placed her small hands on the counter while I rang the book through the system and I couldn't help but stare at them. In my mind, she became the symbol - with her delicate features, wide eyes, and gentle innocence - of what I was going to be fighting for. If I could help save her life, if I could keep this one girl alive, I would be contributing something.
That was forever ago.
Things have changed.
She's still the same beautiful girl that walked in the library doors all those years ago. But today she's turned into something more.
I can see it the moment I open the door to my apartment, which has become our base of operations now that the library is gone. Buffy lobbied for the mansion, saying it had better fighting room and the advantage of not being my home. But I put my foot down. We've never truly discussed what Angelus did to me, other than that one day at the library and I am loath to do so, but she, fortunately didn't press the issue.
Most likely, I believe, because the young woman now standing in my doorway told her to let the subject drop.
"Hello, Willow."
I step back, allowing her to enter. She seems reluctant at first and, were it not daylight, that would frighten me. As it is, it simply sets my mind racing. Something is up, something I fear I don't want to acknowledge.
But that is the way of things where she is concerned. Too much of what I think of when I think of her, I'm afraid to acknowledge.
"Hey Giles." She steps past me into the living room and then pauses as she reaches the couch. I shut the door behind her and move into the living room myself. She watches me as I move over to the fireplace and lean against the mantel before sitting down on the edge of the couch. "You're probably wondering what I'm doing here."
"You're welcome here anytime, Willow. You know that."
She clenches her hands together and refuses to look at me, and I can't quite figure out why. She's either extremely nervous or extremely embarrassed. "Thanks. That means…that means a lot."
I walk over to the opposite end of the couch and sit down, careful to stay far enough away so that I don't frighten her. "Why don't you just come out and say it."
"It's…" She stares at the fireplace, unwilling or unable to meet my eyes. I just sit there quietly, uncertain of what I'm supposed to do. "I don't want anyone else to know and I need to talk to somebody. I mean, Buffy knows but I don't…I can't ask…" Sighing, she looks over at me, "You have to promise me that you won't get mad."
"I can't promise something like that, Willow." I lean back against the cushion, trying not to pay attention to the thoughts that are coursing through my mind. One of the bad things about living on the Hellmouth - as if there are any good - is the predominance of horrible things that you can imagine. "You should know better than to ask."
"No! I mean, it's not a bad thing. At least I don't think it's bad. I didn't do anything magical…well, oh." She purses her lips, knowing that her inability to say it is just making things worse. Taking a deep breath, she looks over at me and stares into my eyes. "I…Oz and I slept together."
Her simple, shy words are like a stake through my heart. "I…I see." I look away from her; unable to hold the contact for fear that some of my emotion might be showing in my eyes. "You'll have to help me here, Willow. I'm afraid I don't see how this concerns me at all." Because there could be no way that she knows my heart when I've just barely acknowledged the truth myself.
"Well, I was just wondering if there was…anything that we'd have to watch out for. Other than the biting."
"Mystically, you mean? I would assume you'd already thought about pregnancy…" My mind shuts down, picturing Willow pregnant.
"No, I mean yes. We thought about that and discarded that as a possibility of something we wanted to do, so we uh…used something. But I was wondering if there was anything we should look out for? Any times of the month…well, other than *those* times that we should avoid…"
"So this is to be a regular thing then?" I knew the question was ridiculous even as it left my mouth, but I didn't have the power to stop it.
"Yeah." She nodded a little reluctantly. "Unless there's a reason that it shouldn't be?"
There are thousand reasons, all of them fully thought out and absolutely unfounded. Somehow declaring that I need her in my life and want her to belong to me doesn't seem like a logical argument. Neither does begging her to realize that she is what keeps me going, that she is what I fight for, what I pride myself on saving at the end of the day.
"No. No reason that I know of." Standing, I walk stiffly over to the stack of books by the stairs and start to dig through them. I've resigned myself to being alone and it's nothing but folly to even dream of her. To get my hopes up so that they can come crashing down around my ankles. I gather a couple of books together and head back to her side. My heart is aching and I want her gone. I want her to go more than I've ever wanted her to stay.
"Giles?" Her hand reaches out and touches my wrist and I nearly drop the books in my hand. "Is…are you alright?" When I don't answer, she squeezes lightly. "Rupert?"
Perhaps it's the fact that we're talking about her sex life that lets her feel comfortable calling me by my first name. Or perhaps it's simply that she wants to make my death come that much quicker.
Either way, I pull y hand from her grasp and sit down at the opposite end of the couch again then hand the books over to her. "I'm fine. I'm sorry that I didn't think of any of this earlier. I hadn't thought…" What a lie that is. It had haunted my thoughts for so long, the knowledge that one day she would give herself to one of them. The certainty that one of them would take her to their bed before too long.
"Well, I don't think that my…my sex life would be our top concern when we've got a mayor working overtime to become a big bad demon thing." She grins and I want to curl up inside the nearest bottle before the image is burned onto my soul. "Well, I think I'd better get going. I have some research to do." She stands and holds the books in front of her. "Thanks Giles."
"It's what I'm here for." I stand up, determined to see her out the door so that I can break the seal on my future and lose myself in the sight of her at the bottom of the bottle. "Just let me know if you have any questions."
"I will." She turns to face me and smiles once more, searing my soul. "Thanks again." Standing on her tiptoes, she places a chaste, gentle kiss on my cheek before darting out the door.
I close the door and lean on it, taking deep breaths of the Willow-scented air. I had thought, when I learned of Buffy's sleeping with Angel, that nothing could be a bigger betrayal
I was wrong.
I lock the door, knowing that I shouldn't, knowing that it will simply cause all of them to worry when they get here tonight, planning on saving the night from another demon. But I don't care. Right now I want to drink myself into a peaceful oblivion and forget I ever saw her green eyes or auburn hair. I want to forget that I let myself hope for even one instant.
I pick up the bottle and flip off the lights, heading for the bedroom.
Where I found my last love dead.
It seems only fitting.