Joyce
My little baby’s been hurting, and I don’t know how to stop it.
For the first time in 17 years, I’m totally helpless. I know I’ve complained before about not having any idea what’s going on in her head, or how to help her, but there's always been something I could do. A hug, a smile, a reassuring word or two, a shoulder to cry on.
I understand why she couldn’t confide in me, but I took so much comfort in her explanation that just knowing I believed in her and loved her, no matter what, gave her strength beyond measure.
But she slept with a man... a vampire, hundreds of years older than her, and didn’t tell me.
More importantly, she fell in love, and she didn’t tell me.
I’d always dreamed about the day my little girl told me she’d fallen in love, but never did I guess that she’d also tell me he was a vampire with a soul, and that he’d then lost his soul and tried to kill her.
Oh, I sometimes wish she’d told me after he changed. I noticed the difference in her immediately. She was so quiet that evening, as I lit the candle on her cupcake. So sad. It was her seventeenth birthday, and she was wiping a tear off her cheek to hide it from me. Something told me I should let her keep her secrets. If she didn’t want to tell me, I knew there had to be a reason. So I accepted her silence, and her tears, and her mute grief, and I waited.
And when she told me... I reacted so harshly.
I’ve never regretted anything more in my life than those words, when I told my daughter to leave. When I almost threw her out of her own home. Those words will haunt me for the rest of my life. “If you leave to save the world, don’t ever come back.” How naive was I? How stupid? No matter how much she wanted to stay, and I wanted her to stay, she couldn’t. The world was in danger, and it was her job to save it.
If I hadn’t got her back...
While I waited for Mr. Giles to find her, or the police, or for my baby to come home, I did a lot of thinking. I didn’t understand half of what she’d told me, but I was willing to do anything to keep her with me, even accept her being a Vampire Slayer. I missed her so much. It was the happiest day of my life when she came back. It even surpassed her birth, and my marriage. I just wanted to pull her into my arms and never let go.
I thought that it would start getting better once she was back; I didn't realise she was about to take a turn for the worse. God, that sounds so cliched.
Angel came back from Hell. I knew the minute she came home from seeing him the first time. I could see it in her eyes. She just crawled onto my lap and cried. I held her for hours, rocking her back and forth until she fell asleep, and I was by her side the whole night. She woke me up many times screaming in terror from nightmares - the nightmares that had seemed to disappear after she came back. I held her until she calmed down, and then I put her back to sleep. For three nights after she had almost non-stop nightmares every night and I slept with half an ear out for her slightest whimper. Then she seemed to get a bit better, but I knew it would take a long time before she was ready to heal.
She moped for a while, and went through some uncontrollable weeping, and non-stop brooding stages. She withdrew, barely ate a thing, started to waste away. Then something changed again. She started to eat properly again, and began to show more concern about her personal hygiene and appearance. It was like she was finally ready to heal. I found out later that that was the time she started the relationship with Xander.
Poor boy, he never got over his crush on her, and she didn’t mean to use him, but I can tell it’s not him she really wants. The one she really wants is forever off-limits. ‘One moment of happiness’, and all that. Damn gypsies and their fool curses.
I’d give up anything to make my baby happy again. Even my eternal soul, and believe me, I know what a risky prospect that is.
He watches her constantly, and she knows he’s there, and he knows she knows but neither of them can do anything. Not even a mother’s love can fix this.
I caught Buffy looking at a travel brochure the other day. The day after she was reading a book entitled ‘Moving to Seattle: A guide.’ At least she’s giving it thought this time, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let her run away without me. If she does this, she’s doing it with me. I lost her once and I won’t let that happen again.
No matter what she thinks, she needs me, and she’s not getting rid of me so easily.
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