Unexpected Love

By Amanda Arlequin

 

 

Willow crouched down to the floor, the book stacks providing the perfect hide out, and cried softly. She tucked her legs up against her chest and laid her head down on her knees, warm tears falling onto her bare skin. "How could he?" she whispered to the empty library. "How can he marry her? It's not fair1"

<Life's not fair, Willow. If Angelus taught you anything it was that. > Well, that truism had been proven in spades that night. In the span of twenty-four hours, Willow had lost perhaps the greatest love she would ever have. She had found a love in a man her best friends had wanted dead, who had, initially, wanted her dead. A man who had murdered her most beloved teacher and her cute little fishes. A man she had despised with all her heart.

Only that had been before the dark moonless night when he came through her bedroom window and initiated the game. A game of chance, a game of love, he said. He professed his attraction to her, drawn by the pure white light of her soul. Light he needed to fill his darkness.

And what had been feeling? Astonished? Horrified? Flattered? She supposed a bit of each, but most of all she had been afraid that first night. She feared him even as she was attracted to him. Who wouldn't have been what with his smoldering brown eyes and perfectly chiseled pants. Hell, even innocent Willow had to admit he looked hot in those leather pants.

From that night on her life had changed. She began to be courted by a demon. Before long, not an evening went by that he didn't attack her on her way home or sneak through her bedroom window as she slept, trying to scare her into thinking that that was the night he was going to drain her. That he would leave her lifeless body on her porch for her parents, or Buffy, or Xander to find. But he never took more than a nibble, and, eventually, Willow came to terms with the fact that he wasn't going to kill her. That it was, in fact, only a game.

Still, no matter what his feelings for her may have been, Willow never let herself forget that he was a demon at heart. Part of her had been so afraid of the threats he whispered into her ear as his hands caressed her body that she never told Buffy about their late night encounters. But that hadn't been the only reason she kept it a secret. There was another part of her, one she hadn't wanted to acknowledge at first, that enjoyed her visits with Angelus. She was ashamed of her body's reaction to his hands and mouth on her skin. She despised the way she would melt just from the way he'd look at her. The shame would come the next day, when he was gone from her presence and she could realize what she had done, again, with a clear mind. She never felt the shame when she was with him though. When he was around the pleasure would block out all her thoughts.

Willow had often dreamt of getting bitten by a vampire, except in her dreams it had been excruciatingly painful. Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined the erotic pleasure a vampire's kiss could provide. In class she's often lapse into daydreams, remembering the feel of Angelus' body on top of hers as they lay on her bed. She would dream of the feel of his mouth nibbling on the hollow of her neck, his tongue marking the spot he would bite from, and then the feeling of his fangs puncturing the delicate skin, suckling her like a baby does his mother's breast. In the midst of their bloodletting, Angelus would inevitably become erect and the feel of him pushing hard between her legs would drive her over the edge. Soon her dreams began to feature what it would be like to be with him completely, to feel him inside her. Willow hadn't had to wait long before that particular dream had become a reality.

Eventually, Willow began to spend her nights with Angelus at Angel's old apartment. She saw less and less of Buffy and Xander and more and more of Angelus. She began to go over to the apartment right after school and many times she wouldn't even go home. Angelus began to invade her body like a poison. She couldn't get enough of him no matter how much time she spent with him, and there was never a moment where he was out of her mind. It came to the point where Willow dreaded going to school in the mornings because she couldn't stand to leave him.

Willow knew that Angelus still killed but she didn't allow herself to dwell on those thoughts for long. She knew a side of him that no one did. As they're relationship developed their time together became less of a game and became more emotionally intimate. It took Angelus a long time to open up- he had to fight his demon, which Willow suspected was a harder fight than her battle with her morals. In the beginning their relationship had contained fear but that was gradually replaced by a love like she had never known. The Angelus she knew and loved was different from the one others did. He was still violent, though never towards her, but he was also kind and gentle and loving, a side of him that only Willow got to see.

Their secret affair lasted for almost a year before they were caught due to sloppiness on their part. They had been making out heavily in the graveyard when Buffy stumbled upon them. Mistaking for their embrace for that of Angelus attacking Willow, Buffy had pulled him off Willow, stake in hand. Willow had thrown herself between the two of them, panicked that they were going to kill each other.

Willow supposed it was shock that stopped Buffy from killing Angelus, and Willow knew it was only as a respect to her wishes that Angelus let it drop. As Buffy stood, frozen to the spot, staring at Angelus with his arms around Willow's waist, Angelus pulled Willow away, snarling at Buffy as he warned her to stay away from them, or the next time he would kill her. Not sure of what else to do, Willow allowed Angelus to lead her home, hoping that Buffy would be able to accept their relationship.

Buffy hadn't. There had been a lot of fighting the next day, though eventually Buffy had said that it was Willow's life and so she could do what she wanted with it. She wasn't going to protect someone who insisted they didn't want to be protected. And so Buffy had deceived Willow, giving not one clue as to what she had planned.

Buffy claimed that she did it for Willow's own good, that Willow wasn't listening to reason, that she had to take matters into her own hands. Willow wasn't able to listen to any of her excuses. Willow stared at his hand wrapped around his waist, trying hard, but failing, to keep herself from slapping Buffy hard against the cheek. Willow's fury, and despair, were tearing her up inside. She had killed Angelus, taken her away from Willow forever, and now Willow didn't want to live. She kept seeing Angel with his arm around Buffy's waist and, for perhaps the first time, Willow got a glimpse into how Buffy must have felt seeing Angelus and Willow together- knowing that this was Angel's body but it wasn't. That those same arms had once wrapped around her, but that they were now the arms of a totally different person, and they were now wrapped around the waist of your best friend. Finally, Willow knew the depth of despair that had possessed Buffy, that Buffy had now given to Willow.

Willow wiped tears from her eyes and looked down at the spell book in her lap. She ran her hand over the soft brown leather, her thoughts turning towards her last hope. Buffy may have thought she had destroyed Angelus forever by bringing Angel back, but Willow harbored her own secret fantasy- one she was just desperate enough to try. Between Ms. Calendar's spell books and Giles' extensive collection Willow was sure she could find a spell to banish somebody's soul. No matter what it took, Willow was going to bring her lover back. It was the only way she could get the heart he had stolen back.