No Regrets...a drabble in fanfic
Mar. 20th, 2005 09:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat"No Regrets"
[At 40, a curious Buffy journeys to visit a humane Spike, reflecting as she does so on her life, her loves, and everything else. No sex.]
No regrets, she thought, climbing the crest of the mountain. It had been a constant chant in the back of her mind during the climb. During this trip, really. A trip, looking back, she realized she was destined to make even though like most of the things she'd experienced she never would have predicted it. Life was like that, not linear, so much as a bunch of dots in a pattern. When you stood admist them you couldn't connect them, even see them, but standing back years later - you saw it, just as she saw the pattern of the houses and trees below her over the cliff's edge, as the breeze careesed her cheek with a silent whoosh. It all made a crazy sort of sense and she wouldn't change a thing.
Oh she'd been lonely at times, striding through her life by herself. But there was a simplicity in making choices on her own. A simplicity she treasured, which may or may not explain why her love affairs seldom panned out, the little she had. Finding a companion to share one's life with wasn't the same as picking out a dress or a leather jacket or even a new house. Sometimes, you never quite found them. And she'd made her peace with that. But she did not regret the ones she left behind her. Neither the relationship nor the leaving.
Her early relationships were the rawest and oddly after forty years, the clearest in her memory. They had been so young, even her older lovers, now that she considered them, arrested as they were in time, unable to age physically. Of the three, Riley had been the only one to escape the trap of time. To live a full and normal human life. At the time she didn't think much on it, but then she'd never been the sort to ponder things or brood too long. She was action girl. That did not mean however, that she didn't think about them or wonder. Now, she wondered how the inability to age physically affected them? Souled or unsouled? Did it somehow stick them in time? What must it have felt like to have the world and everything you knew shift and age around you while you stayed as you were, unchanging, timeless, neither dead nor alive, stuck as it were in time? She shuddered. How horrible. Yet how tempting it had once been to that child she was - the concept of alluding death. Indeed, it had not been until she herself surrendered to it, that she realized death and age were gifts not curses. Unlike her friends, she celebrated the lines around her eyes and mouth, avoiding face-lifts. She earned them and they comforted her, even the frown lines. Time she had learned the hard way was her friend not her enemy. The Immortal had taught her that, during their brief time together, ageless, timeless, he changed his clothes, his hair, his contacts, even his mates, yet he himself stayed the same. What was it, he had said? Don't envy me, slayer - this is no gift, but a curse. Ask your two undead friends sometime - in an honest moment, see what they say?
If you aren't careful, it will drive you insane - the boredom, the repition, the unchanging pattern of existence. Without death...one could not embrace and appreciate life.
She had debated coming here today, just as she had debated sending the letter that precipated this visit. A letter that had been sitting half written in her desk drawer for over five years now. Angel had visited her, a face and voice from a past she'd thought long gone and buried in the landfill that had once been Sunnydale, California. It wasn't the first time she'd heard from him, of course. Just the first she'd seen him. They had corresponded off and on during the intervening years, after the disaster in LA and the dark times that had followed leading finally and inevitably to his transformation. When she last saw him, he had aged. Lines creased his face, gray sparkled his hair, he looked like a man of 65, not the 26 year old vampire she remembered. It had shocked her. His life like hers had had its own twists and turns, leading him places that she realized were inevitable. Not once in the intervening years had he mentioned any of his family, vampire or otherwise, or his friends in LA. The one's they'd shared, long dead and she knew, those deaths hung heavy on him still. No, it was not until the last visit, the one in which she saw him face to face, that he mentioned Spike and told her at last what had happened to him. Speaking in clean short sentences, he laid it out then with a sad shake of his head and a gentle smile, was gone back to his life wherever that may be. They'd kissed. Like they always did. But the kiss did not hold the same magic it once had or the same drama. With older eyes she saw what she could not or would not see as an budding young woman - a tragic man, out of his time, caught and twisted by fate as opposed to in control of it. But then, she had found a way to make peace with her own father in the intervening years and knew in her heart this was something he would never have the ability to do.
Why he felt the need to tell her about Spike, now after all these years, did not make sense to her. When she asked, he refused to explain it. Said she should ask Spike, it was between them. He was merely playing messenger.
So why was she here? She wondered. It wasn't a mission of love - out of some romance novel, like her sister supposed. Nor a journey of regret. If anything, it was out of curiousity. To see who he'd become, now that he was a man and no longer a vampire. Now that he was no longer outside time, but rather in it.
Like herself. Knowing Spike, she doubted he regretted much. He wasn't like Angel, he hated to brood on things. Seeing the past as just that the past. She often wondered if that was how he maintained his sanity? Keeping up with the trends.
So how old was he now? 65 like Angel? Or 40 like herself? Angel hadn't said.
He just gave her the address, explained the shanshu effect, and told her a little about what transpired in LA. They'd both shanshued, Angel said. At different times and for different reasons, he refused to provide details. Typical Angel. Or men in general. He also refused to tell her how he was dealing with the change. From his face and general appearance, she guessed not well. He looked tired, worn. The years hung heavy on him. Unlike herself, he clearly had regrets and wore them daily like chains. The chains you bore in life...she shook her head. Oh well, he had a family now - not to mention a grandchild, something he also refused to explain outside of the requisite photos. Connor's child, she was told. A chapter of Angel's life she'd missed and reflecting on it now, had little interest in. They had parted ways ages ago, it just took them a while to recognize it. Love was like that, it didn't disappear all at once, so much as fade in stages, lingering, like a closed over scar or missing limb, tingling from time to time. Her love for Angel would always tingle, but that was all it was now, a tingle, small, contained, reminding her that she was alive and with no regrets.
The house stood a few feet away from her, shrouded with columbine flowers and pine trees. Quaint. Not flashy like she expected. Seeing him would be strange after all this time. Especially considering she had, until five years ago, believed him to be dead and buried with the rest of Sunnydale. It felt odd even now to think of Spike as alive, let alone a living, breathing, human in the world.
TBC...maybe...if geek part of me has her way.
Sleep now, perchance to rest.
[At 40, a curious Buffy journeys to visit a humane Spike, reflecting as she does so on her life, her loves, and everything else. No sex.]
No regrets, she thought, climbing the crest of the mountain. It had been a constant chant in the back of her mind during the climb. During this trip, really. A trip, looking back, she realized she was destined to make even though like most of the things she'd experienced she never would have predicted it. Life was like that, not linear, so much as a bunch of dots in a pattern. When you stood admist them you couldn't connect them, even see them, but standing back years later - you saw it, just as she saw the pattern of the houses and trees below her over the cliff's edge, as the breeze careesed her cheek with a silent whoosh. It all made a crazy sort of sense and she wouldn't change a thing.
Oh she'd been lonely at times, striding through her life by herself. But there was a simplicity in making choices on her own. A simplicity she treasured, which may or may not explain why her love affairs seldom panned out, the little she had. Finding a companion to share one's life with wasn't the same as picking out a dress or a leather jacket or even a new house. Sometimes, you never quite found them. And she'd made her peace with that. But she did not regret the ones she left behind her. Neither the relationship nor the leaving.
Her early relationships were the rawest and oddly after forty years, the clearest in her memory. They had been so young, even her older lovers, now that she considered them, arrested as they were in time, unable to age physically. Of the three, Riley had been the only one to escape the trap of time. To live a full and normal human life. At the time she didn't think much on it, but then she'd never been the sort to ponder things or brood too long. She was action girl. That did not mean however, that she didn't think about them or wonder. Now, she wondered how the inability to age physically affected them? Souled or unsouled? Did it somehow stick them in time? What must it have felt like to have the world and everything you knew shift and age around you while you stayed as you were, unchanging, timeless, neither dead nor alive, stuck as it were in time? She shuddered. How horrible. Yet how tempting it had once been to that child she was - the concept of alluding death. Indeed, it had not been until she herself surrendered to it, that she realized death and age were gifts not curses. Unlike her friends, she celebrated the lines around her eyes and mouth, avoiding face-lifts. She earned them and they comforted her, even the frown lines. Time she had learned the hard way was her friend not her enemy. The Immortal had taught her that, during their brief time together, ageless, timeless, he changed his clothes, his hair, his contacts, even his mates, yet he himself stayed the same. What was it, he had said? Don't envy me, slayer - this is no gift, but a curse. Ask your two undead friends sometime - in an honest moment, see what they say?
If you aren't careful, it will drive you insane - the boredom, the repition, the unchanging pattern of existence. Without death...one could not embrace and appreciate life.
She had debated coming here today, just as she had debated sending the letter that precipated this visit. A letter that had been sitting half written in her desk drawer for over five years now. Angel had visited her, a face and voice from a past she'd thought long gone and buried in the landfill that had once been Sunnydale, California. It wasn't the first time she'd heard from him, of course. Just the first she'd seen him. They had corresponded off and on during the intervening years, after the disaster in LA and the dark times that had followed leading finally and inevitably to his transformation. When she last saw him, he had aged. Lines creased his face, gray sparkled his hair, he looked like a man of 65, not the 26 year old vampire she remembered. It had shocked her. His life like hers had had its own twists and turns, leading him places that she realized were inevitable. Not once in the intervening years had he mentioned any of his family, vampire or otherwise, or his friends in LA. The one's they'd shared, long dead and she knew, those deaths hung heavy on him still. No, it was not until the last visit, the one in which she saw him face to face, that he mentioned Spike and told her at last what had happened to him. Speaking in clean short sentences, he laid it out then with a sad shake of his head and a gentle smile, was gone back to his life wherever that may be. They'd kissed. Like they always did. But the kiss did not hold the same magic it once had or the same drama. With older eyes she saw what she could not or would not see as an budding young woman - a tragic man, out of his time, caught and twisted by fate as opposed to in control of it. But then, she had found a way to make peace with her own father in the intervening years and knew in her heart this was something he would never have the ability to do.
Why he felt the need to tell her about Spike, now after all these years, did not make sense to her. When she asked, he refused to explain it. Said she should ask Spike, it was between them. He was merely playing messenger.
So why was she here? She wondered. It wasn't a mission of love - out of some romance novel, like her sister supposed. Nor a journey of regret. If anything, it was out of curiousity. To see who he'd become, now that he was a man and no longer a vampire. Now that he was no longer outside time, but rather in it.
Like herself. Knowing Spike, she doubted he regretted much. He wasn't like Angel, he hated to brood on things. Seeing the past as just that the past. She often wondered if that was how he maintained his sanity? Keeping up with the trends.
So how old was he now? 65 like Angel? Or 40 like herself? Angel hadn't said.
He just gave her the address, explained the shanshu effect, and told her a little about what transpired in LA. They'd both shanshued, Angel said. At different times and for different reasons, he refused to provide details. Typical Angel. Or men in general. He also refused to tell her how he was dealing with the change. From his face and general appearance, she guessed not well. He looked tired, worn. The years hung heavy on him. Unlike herself, he clearly had regrets and wore them daily like chains. The chains you bore in life...she shook her head. Oh well, he had a family now - not to mention a grandchild, something he also refused to explain outside of the requisite photos. Connor's child, she was told. A chapter of Angel's life she'd missed and reflecting on it now, had little interest in. They had parted ways ages ago, it just took them a while to recognize it. Love was like that, it didn't disappear all at once, so much as fade in stages, lingering, like a closed over scar or missing limb, tingling from time to time. Her love for Angel would always tingle, but that was all it was now, a tingle, small, contained, reminding her that she was alive and with no regrets.
The house stood a few feet away from her, shrouded with columbine flowers and pine trees. Quaint. Not flashy like she expected. Seeing him would be strange after all this time. Especially considering she had, until five years ago, believed him to be dead and buried with the rest of Sunnydale. It felt odd even now to think of Spike as alive, let alone a living, breathing, human in the world.
TBC...maybe...if geek part of me has her way.
Sleep now, perchance to rest.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-03-21 03:38 am (UTC)From his face and general appearance, she guessed not well. He looked tired, worn. The years hung heavy on him. Unlike herself, he clearly had regrets and wore them daily like chains. The chains you bore in life... Yes, I can see how Angel would treat his humanity like this. The essential man always remains the same.