Title: A Place in the World
Author: velvet_midnight
Fandom: BtVS
Pairing/Characters: Willow Rosenberg/Rupert Giles
Summary: a moment in time in England. written for 100_situations, table 2, prompt 05. River
Warnings/Spoilers: set post- Grave , pre-s7.


One day in England, he takes her on a walk, through fields and misty moors, pointing out this rock face or that flower or asking how the sun feels to her newly rehabilitated mind. He takes her to a river, bubbling, but still calm and asks her to feel it. She sits, silent, hearing nothing but the babble of water, feeling nothing but air wave over her, goosebumps on her flesh as she melts out of it.

She can feel him watching, as he always does.

"You're going to ruin my concentration if you keep doing that," she murmurs; she can feel him narrow his eyes, feel a bite of laughter choke off.

"You're improving."

She opens her eyes, catches his gaze; he's looking at her, but his glasses are tinted from the sun. She can't see his eyes, but she knows they're soft. They're always soft when he looks at her, even after all she's done. After she threw it all away and almost never got it back.

"All thanks to you."

He smiles, ducks his head; takes off his glasses and polishes them. He's embarrassed. All the English she's met are flustered when faced with feelings.

"I did nothing," he says, replacing his glasses and staring at the river. "You've come…very far on your own."

She snorts, looks down at her hands and at the grass. "Yeah. I no longer feel the need to destroy the world. That's a plus."

He looks at her sharply; she knows he feels at least partly at fault. He left, ran away, as she once accused of him. Maybe if he had been there, he could've stopped her, helped her…She sees all these ideas as clearly as she sees the waves of riverwater in the air.

They don't share words after that. They share the space of the world.

 

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