simplestgift | Twenty Bells: [Action/Voice]

Entry tags:

Twenty Bells: [Action/Voice]

[He'd won her a stuffed penguin. She'd been hanging on his arm and squeezing it with a giant grin on her face. Everything felt, finally, like it was going to be okay. Like this trouble between them since sleeping together was just a little thing.

He turns away to grab a strawberry daiquiri for her, still holding her hand. When he turns back, she's gone.

He wanders Lucetiland for a while, looking for her, shaking, still holding the drink, but he knows what's happened. When someone dematerializes while you are touching them...

She was just there, grinning, cheeks rosy. The warmth of her hand hasn't quite faded yet.

He sits on a bench in the middle of the park, staring into space, and nothing in the world draws his attention until, mechanically, he draws out his journal. He's shaking too badly to write, so he has to voice it, and he sounds weak.]

Dawn Summers was sent home.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

...Perhaps.

[ a hard swallow. ] You check. I'll -- I'll find you once I'm out.

All right. [He's not going to check. He knows. And going to her apartment and seeing it empty will only seal it.]

[ hours later, a raw voice hits the journal feed: ] Where are you?

Home. [His voice also sounds very raw, and exhausted.]

Then I'm coming over.

[ no question. no waiting for an invite. the journal's already shut. ]

[Archie closes the journal as well, then belatedly realizes he is, by eighteenth-century terms, undressed. He starts fishing around for a waistcoat and coat, and will still be doing so when Buffy arrives.]

[ and this time buffy summers doesn't knock. ]

[He glances up, holding his waistcoat. He is red-eyed and altogether kind of looking like a mess.]

Buffy?

[ by contrast, buffy's face is hard. empty. such a hollow woman when she feels she needs to be. but her brittle shield wavers and soon she is pushing aside archie's waistcoat -- it is an obstacle -- and is hugging him close. slayer strength locks the sailor into the embrace.

she understands all of this all too well. ]

OOF!

[It's so unexpected, he simply holds his arms out to the side for a moment. Then, as if remembering what comes next, he wraps his arms around her, holding her tight.

Mutual comfort. They've both lost.]

[ no words. she would hate to spoil this with words. just the hug and -- dare she think it! -- love. sisterly; in both iterations of the bond. ]

[Love.

The moment holds for a long time, and Archie is in no rush to get it over with. Convention doesn't even matter. This is all there is right now: grief, and the true knowledge that he is going through this with someone who understands every note of it.]

[ convention be damned. buffy has never been a fan of it; she isn't going to start now. her fingers dig desperate little holds into the back of archie's shoulders and she realizes she's probably pressing his wings rather uncomfortably and only then lets up her grip. ]

[He takes that as a sign, and begins to release her. He didn't even notice that she was pressing his wings.]

...I'm sorry, Archie.

[ hoarse. she's been crying. ]

[His voice is low and cracks a little when he speaks.] So am I.

For what it's worth...[ she actually doesn't know how to finish that sentence. her mouth hangs open -- lost, stricken beyond her own comprehension. there is nothing in this world or any world so precious to her as dawn summers. losing her is very literally like losing a part of herself.

so she simply renews her hug and falls silent once again. ]

I love her. [He squeezes her gently.] I never had that before.

...Not many of us get to be so lucky. [ she says it rather ironically; she understands the parallel to that evening in the woods after jack's disappearance. better to have loved and lost... ]

I could tell, you know. A big sister always knows. She loves you right back. [ no past tense allowed. ]

I know. [She'd said as much. Except he'd never quite believed she could love someone like him. Maybe she wanted to pretend everything was okay, but in the end, that had only saved time, hadn't it? They were happy together.

But she's forgotten him now.]

Not anymore.

...It doesn't happen like that. Not -- Jack, Archie. [ she seizes upon the example with particular ferocity. ] He forgot but then he remembered. And it was like years of love hitting him all at once. It's -- it's possible.

She could come back. She's done it before. This was her second time here.

[ delusional, her. sometimes. ]

And she didn't remember this time, did she?

...She wasn't even here a month, last time.

[A deep breath.] I hope you're right. [A dozen little Kennedys. It was like a nursery rhyme.]

...Me, too.

[ voice ]

[ voice ]

[ voice ]

[ voice ]

[ voice ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]

[ action ]