By Pixie

"Daddy, will you read me a story?" The little girl asked, as her father tucked her into bed one night. Her father was a gentle man, and while he didn't talk excessively, like his brown-haired friend, he was great at reading stories. She loved her father's voice.

"Sure," He replied, glancing through the various fairy tales that lined his daughter's bookshelves. "What do you want to hear?"

She thought for a moment. "I'm tired of all the other stories. Would you tell me something new?"

Her father sat on the edge of her bed. "Like what?"

Ari smiled. "A good story!"

He laughed softly. "Alright." He thought for a moment. "I've got one."

"Once upon a time..." His daughter began for him.

"Once upon a time," He said with a smile. "There was a pretty normal guy. Atleast, he thought he was. He lived in an unusual place, though, where all sorts of monsters and ghosts and other scary things were. But he was always pretty safe."

"What was the place called, Daddy?" Ari interuppted.

"Er... Bright Haven." He said, after a pause. "So this guy, we'll call him Joe, he was pretty happy. He liked to play music, and he said some pretty nice friends. But he was missing something."

"What?"

"A girl. Someone who challenged him and loved him, and who he loved, too. He didn't even realize how much he was missing that someone until one night."

"What night?"

"A Tuesday. He was playing music at a ball, a... uh, a costume ball. And there was a girl in the audience that caught his eye. She was an angel... or an eskimo, depending on what version you're telling. And her hair was like a sunset. A beautiful shade of red that Joe always wanted to touch because it felt like silk and smelled like vanilla."

"Red like Ariel's in The Little Mermaid??"

"Just like Ariel's, except maybe a little shorter."

"Was she pretty?" Ari asked with a smile, snuggling deeper into her covers.

"She was the most beautiful girl in the whole land. Heck, the whole world. Not even the princess that everyone thought was snobby named Lorelia could hold a candle to her."

"What was the angel's name?"

"Cyprus" He went on again before his daughter could interuppt. "But she wasn't an angel, exactly. She fought all of the monsters in her land with a few other good people. She was actually a witch. A good witch."

"Like Glinda?"

Her father smiled. "Like Glinda. And he searched for her, just like Cinderella, too. Except he didn't have her shoe. And one day, some kind ... er, knights in three-piece suits brought them together."

"Did they live happily ever after?" Ari asked excitedly.

"Not yet." He replied. "First, they had to get to know eachother. And while he found himself loving her everyday, there was someone standing in the way of her loving him back."

"Was it an awful monster?"

"No, it wasn't even really a villian. Just a very confused guy named Lander. Many years ago, someone had cast a spell on Cyprus, making her fall in love with Lander. The spell would hold fast until she felt one moment of true love that surpassed her's for Lander. Then the spell would be broken."

"Did Lander love Cyprus?"

"Not the way Joe did. Lander loved the sometimes snobby princess Lorelia. But he did love Cyprus. They were friends."

"Cool. Did Joe have to make Cyprus fall in love with him?"

"He wanted her to, very much, but he wouldn't ever force her to try and feel things she wasn't ready for. He wasn't that kind of guy, he didn't think that was fair. He wanted her to fall in love with him because she liked him as a person, not because he'd bought her things or treated her like a princess. Even though he did that, too."

"So what happened?"

"Well, Joe learned he wasn't as normal as he thought. He had a disease, sort-of, and every month, he turned into a big, slobbering wolf-type creature."

"Like the beast from Beauty and the Beast?"

"Like the beast. But, luckily, Cyprus was understanding, and they dealt with that problem pretty well."

"So what happened between them?"

"Joe courted the fair Cyprus for many months, and they grew closer and closer together. She began to fall in love with him, even though the spell still held. And then one day, an evil demon by the name of Fluke cast it's shadow upon the land, and Lander and Cyprus began to sneak away with eachother and do bad things."

Ari's eyes widened. "Like what?!"

"They kissed eachother, and they weren't honest about it, because the Fluke demon was very bad and wouldn't let them."

"What happened then?!"

"One day, Lander and Cyprus went missing, and Joe and Lorelia, worried for their loves, searched for them. They found them kissing eachother on a makeshift bed. The Fluke demon and another monster that had been imported from Britain named Trike had teamed up and locked them away in a basement-type room. It wasn't pretty."

Ari was very upset. "Poor Joe and Lorelia."

"Yes," Her father said. "But in a way it was good. Because when Cyprus saw how she had hurt Joe, she felt that one moment of true love, and realized what a mistake she'd made. The spell had been broken, although it lingered for awhile. Still, Joe was very torn up about it. He even lost his torso."

Ari's eyes widened. "EWW!! Really??"

"No." He smiled. "But he'd felt like he did. Still, since he loved his Cyprus so much, once he had recovered from his broken heart a bit, they began to court again."

"Was it romantic when they did?"

Her father smiled. "You bet. It was a starry evening, a Christmas Eve in fact, and a lad named Barry White sang for them as they reconciled."

Ari smiled dreamily. "Then what?"

He thought for a moment. "It was hard for Cyprus and Joe to rebuild their relationship. After all, they were growing up in Bright Haven, and they spent most of their time fighting evil demon-creatures. But they still continued to fall deeply in love with eachother, and one evening, the night before a particularly scary Demon Day, they showed eachother how much they loved eachother."

"How'd they do that?"

He smirked. "You'll learn about that later." He paused while his daughter yawned. "After the Demon Day, things between Cyprus and Joe were different, but very, very good. They had their problems, of course, but they always resolved them."

"Did they live happily ever after?"

"I'm getting there." He smiled. "Let's see, what happens next..."

"One fair, sunny morning, Cyprus and Joe were married before all the land?" A soft voice piped up from behind him.

Ari's father turned around and saw Ari's mother, standing in the doorframe, a smile on her face.

He smiled. "I thought it was just their close friends and family."

"Depends on the version you're hearing." She replied sweetly.

He grinned, and turned his attention back to Ari. "So, they were married, and one day, a little while later, their beautiful daughter was born."

"What was her name?"

"Ana." He smiled. "You wanna finish?"

Ari smiled gleefully. "They lived happily ever after?"

Oz smiled softly at Willow, as he turned to look at her again. "So far." She returned the smile, her eyes lingering on his for a moment, before she quietly slipped back into the hallway.

Ari yawned, settling back into bed. "I like that story a lot."

Oz stroked his daughter's hair back from her face, and kissed her forehead. "So do I."

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The End
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