This was, of course, written for the Buffyverse Femslash Ficathon. I was assigned Faith/Tara, which I can totally see, but the request also specified human AU, which set me back on my heels. I don't like human AU as a rule, because I've rarely, if ever, seen it really well done. Often, especially in places like AFF.net, it's an excuse for Spike to be a hard-drinkin', hard-fuckin' rock star and Buffy to be an innocent wide-eyed kindergarten teacher, and really? No thank you! But, the thing about ficathons is that they force you to think, and before long I'd really gotten behind this idea.

I am such a sucker for "Faith" puns in my titles (or, in the case of Tru Calling, "true" puns. GAH.) When other people do it, it's annoying. When I do it, it's deeply significant. In this case, I had the title before I had even plotted the story (usually the title comes after I've written at least part of it). The request asked for Faith noticing how gentle Tara was, and tender lovemaking. The idea of "healing" came early, and the idea that Tara would help Faith get her life together is present throughout. Faith learns to believe in herself...hence the title.

The diner wasn't Faith's kind of place.

I've noticed I have a tendency to start stories and sections of stories with description, so here we start with Faith's surroundings. Originally I was going to start with her getting kicked out of a bar--in medias res!--but that pushed her meeting with Tara fifteen hundred words into the future.

Under a few years of grime and neglect, it was halfway homey, with little touches that showed somebody had cared, once.

The diner is a metaphor for Faith's life, of course.

Even if there were more cigarette burns and food stains than red-checked linen, still, the curtains matched the tablecloths. There were cutesy little glass holders over stubby candle-ends on each table, and framed pictures on the walls of somebody's happy life--kids playing in parks, picnic spreads, barbeques. The photographs showed people too ugly to be models, and their burgers were too charred to be anything but real.

I can see this diner in my head, but I see it from the outside: through these dirty windows, with the candlelight glimmering inside. It's raining, the kind of rain that gets inside your clothes in seconds (even though it's not raining in the story). It might be the same place where Buffy worked in "Anne". My first BtVS canon reference--the first of many. You give me human AU to work with, and I stick as much canon in as possible!

Faith didn't believe in homeyness, or happy families enjoying outings, or that the food here had ever passed the health inspection, as a yellowed certificate on the door promised it had.

This is one of my trademark sentence-structures in the Buffyverse. I try to keep as few as possible, but they slip through.

But at two in the morning, when the latest bar she'd trashed had told her quite emphatically that she wasn't welcome back as long as they could remember her face, it was about all she could afford til morning.

The woman behind the counter was pushing forty-five from the wrong side, with nicotine-stained fingertips and brittle, colourless hair tied back in a messy bun. Her only comment on Faith's entrance was to flick her cigarette at an ashtray and glance at the coffee pot.

My OCs are rarely more than window dressing.

Faith nodded yes to the coffee, automatically testing the weight of coins jingling in her jeans pocket. Looked like this was one bill she wouldn't have to run out on. She had maybe three dollars, probably enough for a muffin or something to stop her stomach from hurting, at least until she could scam some idiot into buying her a meal in the hope of getting into her pants. That wasn't going to happen if she couldn't clean up a bit. Then maybe she'd have to really put out. If the guy was decent enough, that could work out for both of them. But no decent guy trawled this part of town at this time of night--or, if he did, then he wasn't looking for just a quick fuck. So it was the diner until dawn, and then she'd have to find somewhere to sleep.

So Faith is a prostitute, I guess. As soon as I wrote this, I thought, "I'm going to have such a headache when it comes to safe sex later." Then I...let it slip. I often imagine that the sex is safe, but I rarely write the details. I think if I wrote boyslash or het, I would definitely mention lube and condoms and so forth, but with f/f I let it slide.

The coffee was piping hot and tasted burnt. Faith bent over the mug, cupping it in both hands. The heat, at least, was welcome, and the bitterness--well, she'd put worse things in her mouth, so whatever. It was a change from the furry-mouthed taste of stale alcohol. She never had to worry about paying for drinks. There were enough people just tripping over themselves to offer her as much as she could chug. If she'd been an optimist, that would probably count as an upside. Since she wasn't, she accepted the drinks and said thanks by wearing out potential partners on the dancefloor. That was as good as life got, and it still wasn't much. Faith accepted that. She could let the rest of the mess around her pass her by as long as she was dancing.

My Faith can survive anything as long as there's dancing. Also, have you noticed we're STILL with the opening description? Where's the action? Often my stories are mean to me like this.

The waitress walked by and rolled her eyes at Faith's nearly untouched cup. She probably knew that she wasn't even going to get a tip out of it. With an irritated sigh, she took the coffee pot to a booth at the back of the diner. Faith glanced over her shoulder. She hadn't known there were any other customers. She'd kind of wanted the place to herself. The waitress she could ignore. Years of practice took care of that.

This idea (ignoring people) came out more strongly in the other fic I wrote at the same time, where Fowley and Scully meet in a bathroom. It comes from a sociology class I had, wherein we discussed how other people are "not allowed" to exist where we are performing embarrassing functions.

Other people, though--too often they wanted to chat, to share the dog-end hours of the night, to try for one last pick-up. Faith wasn't in the mood.

Until the waitress's arm moved to pour the coffee and Faith saw the girl's face.

She'd lit the candle in the middle of the table, even though the wick was too long and the flame was barely a point of light floating in a puddle of wax.

I like this visual and I tried to duplicate it with my own candle, but it doesn't really work.

Her skin was pale, and her hair hung long over one shoulder, dirty blonde and wind-tangled. Her eyes were wide, and bright blue, and she was crying. The grease-yellow candlelight

I think grease-yellow is the perfect colour for light in this diner.

glimmered off the tears streaming down her face. Of course the waitress saw, but she'd probably seen far worse in this dump over the years. Faith figured that, like her, the waitress had learned to tune out any problem that wasn't hers. Besides, the girl wasn't making any noise, and she smiled wanly at the waitress when she'd refilled her cup. But the tears went on pouring down her cheeks, silently, and when the waitress left, the girl's head dipped forward, until her hair hid her face.

Hair hiding Tara's face is such a canon/fanon cliché. But she really does it, so...I work within the tradition. This is the picture that inspired the description--a bit of a badder Tara than we're used to.

Faith turned back to her own cup of coffee, but the girl's face wouldn't leave her alone. She bit her lip, swirled the oily coffee around the mug, then set it down so hard that some spilled over the rim. She swung her legs off the stool at the counter and headed for the girl's booth.

"Hey, no one's sitting here, right?" she asked, throwing herself down in the padded seat across from the girl, not waiting for permission.

My Faith uses a lot of tag questions.

The girl looked up, startled. "N-no," she said, and blushed. Quickly, she swiped at her tears and tried to sniff without being obvious. She attempted to pull herself together, but instead her breath hitched in a hiccupy sob.

Faith drummed her fingers on the tabletop and looked out the grimy window, pretending not to notice. Jeez, she didn't know why she'd come over here. She remembered when she'd hitched here from Boston, broke and broken. The first week she'd nearly starved to death, and got a worse beating than her dad ever dished out at home. This girl had that look, of someone thrown out on her ass for the first time. Faith had been there, sure, but she sucked at helping people. She'd never really wanted to help, either. You just didn't. It was right up there on the list of rules she'd figured out to keep her going day after day.

Faith has had it tough, and believes she's tough (this backstory would fit perfectly well in canon), but she really does want to help. Obviously. Unreliable narrator! Fun!

It the way the tears had been falling, Faith decided, as if the girl was so far gone in terror and uncertainty that she didn't even know she was crying. The kind of tears that tore at your heart, even after you'd decided most definitely that you didn't have one.

Faith sighed and pulled a half-crushed pack of smokes out of her jacket pocket. Now that she was over here she had no clue what to say. The candle guttered between them, sputtering softly.

I love this sound that candles make, that usually you can only hear when it's really quiet. This is how I write silence.

Faith lit her cigarette, the first breath of smoke hitting her lungs just right.

The girl turned her head, and Faith followed her gaze. There was a No Smoking sticker glued to the window pane, grubby and smoke stained.

I was really stuck here for dialogue, since neither of them really wants to talk, or knows what to say. It makes no sense for this diner to be smoke free--I'd already established that the waitress is smoking, and there are cigarette burns everywhere--but I needed them to interact some more and they refused to talk to each other. Plus, it's good to establish the ways in which Tara is strong: she believes in rules, and in following them, especially if not following them would harm someone else.

"You gotta be kidding," Faith said.

The girl retreated with a half-shrug.

"You think anybody pays attention to that?" Faith asked. This girl really was straight off the turnip truck

Literally! Hee.

if she thought people did what the little signs said. Nobody around here listened until the cops got out the megaphones, and sometimes not even then. "The fucking waitress has been smoking since I got here," she pointed out.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself!

Another shrug.

Faith was about to throw up her hand and leave, tears or no tears, but the girl was watching her from behind the fall of her hair, and now there was a glint of challenge in her eyes. Really. Mousy and afraid but willing to fight over just where the smoking section was. Maybe there was something to her after all. Faith gave an amused snort and crushed out the smoke on the table, letting it join all the other burn marks.

Faith gets off on people standing up to her. She wants to win, yes, but mainly she just wants to fight. Why do you think she and Buffy had this whole dominance/sex thing?

"So you maybe wanna ditch this place? No laws against smoking outside, I hope."

"I-it's bad for you," the girl said, earnestly, as if Faith hadn't seen and ignored every black-rotted lung on every pack of smokes she'd ever opened.

"I plan to die young," Faith said. The fact that it wasn't really a plan and more of an immediate probability didn't bother her at the moment. "Leave a pretty corpse."

This line is directly out of canon. I forget which episode. I'm not above borrowing dialogue to suit my fics (copyright be damned!), but I try not to make it horribly meta or tongue-in-cheek, like, "Look! Show-dialogue! See what I can do!" Well...except for right now, of course.

"You would," the girl said, with a lopsided smile.

My Tara is out and proud. She can flirt, even if she's shy. Give the girl some credit, y'all!

Faith's eyebrows raised, the possibilities of this meeting suddenly becoming more attractive. She let her tongue flick out to wet her lower lip. The girl's eyes followed it. Faith sat back and smiled, feeling pretty damn self-satisfied. Definite possibilities. "I'm Faith. You got a name?"

"T-Tara."

Faith nodded. "So, let me guess. You just got in to town and don't have a place yet." She was willing to leave Tara whatever dignity she still had, and pretend she just hadn't gotten around to her hotel--as if, given a chance, she'd choose to be sitting in this greasy spoon at three in the morning.

"No," Tara said, and that hint of challenge was back. She had a backbone underneath all that shyness. Faith liked it.

"Okay. If you want, I know a place."

Faith doesn't have a place to live. I don't know if she sleeps on the street or if she worms her way into someone's bed every night. She's been in several shelters for a night or two when she's desperate, but usually she's too proud.

Tara hesitated. She probably thought Faith meant her place, which wasn't a half-bad thought. Too bad the last time she'd had a roof over her head was back in Boston. Even then it wasn't worth much.

More canon--Faith's mother is dead; she says so in "Faith, Hope, and Trick". More fanon--her father is abusive. Again, I'm keeping backstory as similar to the show's as possible; it's the only way I can think of human AUs as 'real'.

"For real," she said. "I'm not gonna mug you or anything either. I just...figured I could help." She shrugged apologetically, because probably Tara didn't know why she'd want to help. Faith, for her part, didn't know why anyone would want her help, even if it was offered.

Faith has no self-esteem. This sentence was really hard to write, because I couldn't get the rhythms or the emphasis right, and I struggled with pronouns for a long time. It still feels off. I used italics, which work okay on "want" but just are awkward on "her", even though I'm trying to emphasize that no one would want her (Faith's) help.

But Tara smiled, the half-grin that was strangely cute,

It is!

and Faith couldn't help smiling back. Okay, maybe one good deed didn't exactly make her a superhero,

Another canon reference, and also, in my mind at least, a nod towards my fic "Walkabout", which is all about what it means to be a hero and what it means to save someone.

but she felt better knowing Tara wasn't going alone into the L.A. night. It was fucking dangerous out there.

Vampire reference.

Even though she hadn't touched her coffee, Faith left her three dollars on the table, and waved Tara's money away.

That felt good, too.

This whole scene was, for me, a "landmark"--something I knew was going to get incorporated into the fic, which was, basically, Tara crying and Faith comforting her, late at night in an L.A. bar (it turned into a diner later). I didn't know it was going to turn into a story with several scenes (like, separated by ellipses), but I'm glad this scene ended here, because this way, later in the story, I can use ellipses as time-passage markers, even though here the time passage between scenes is very short.

"It's after curfew," a strident voice complained as lights went on and a series of locks thunked open. Tara started to back away, but Faith caught her hand and shook her head. Finally, the door cracked open and a face peered out at Faith. "Oh, it's you. We're full."

Didn't want to give away that it was Anya until Faith said it. Anya was in the request, and I'd just finished writing the fic in which she has the most prominent role I've ever given her--in "Je me souviens". There, she was snarky in her regular background way. Here, I wanted to give her the chance to be an actual character, but still with Anya's quirks.

"Aw, come on, Anya, you know you're gonna let me in," Faith wheedled. "Otherwise I'll just keep knocking."

"You're a disturber of the peace."

"You figured that out, did you?"

"I could call the police."

"You hate the police."

Anya tilted her head, considering that. "You're right." She frowned, then brightened. "I'll release the hounds!"

"Rover and Fido love me, Anya." Faith winked at Tara.

I love this entire exchange--I wrote it effortlessly. The "releasing the hounds" thing comes from the Simpsons, i.e., "Smithers! Release the robotic Richard Simmons!" But don't you think, if Anya had hounds, she'd release them? They are my aunt's dogs, which makes no sense since my aunt's dogs were collies and they are beagles, but trust me, they are. Their names come from my Grandpa: whenever he told jokes, the guys were always either "George" or "Zeke", and the dogs were always "Fido" and "Rover".

"Hmm." Anya nodded. "That leaves me with two options. Buy earplugs, or kill you where you stand. Where did I put my baseball bat...?"

"If you were any other man, I would kill you where you stand!" Worf to Picard, in First Contact. When I write Anya, I write her the way I think--in quotes and weird metaphorical references that just pop to the surface. The baseball bat is Mulder's from "The Unnatural".

"I've got someone with me who needs a place to stay. One night, I promise."

"Well, why didn't you say so!" Anya opened the door wide. "I think maybe there's one bed left. Second floor, first door on your right, sheets are in the linen closet, no drugs on the premises, breakfast is at eight."

Faith tugged on Tara's hand and pulled her into the tiny entryway. "Anya, this is Tara. Tara, this is Anya Jenkins. Don't listen to her."

Anya pursed her lips and studied Tara. "I like you."

Tara smiled uncertainly. "Th-thanks."

Anya nodded, then turned back to Faith. "We frown on fraternization here."

"Plus you don't like people screwing in your place." Faith shrugged. "Don't worry. I'm gonna split."

More dialogue from canon, of course--the Mayor and Faith. Whenever I use dialogue straight from an ep--usually in the course of rewriting said ep to my own pornish ends--I like to give it to someone new to say, or else change the circumstance in which it's said. Here, it foreshadows that Faith and Tara are going to sleep together. Anya's intuitive like that. Also, Faith has brought both girls and guys to the drop-in centre before, though never as nobly as for Tara.

Tara opened her mouth to say something, then ducked back behind her hair, hunching her shoulders. Anya said something approaching "Humph!" and slammed the door shut behind Faith. "I also have a couch in the common room."

Faith grinned. "I knew you loved me."

This is vintage me. I say it all the time.

Anya crossed her arms. "You're arrogant, a chronic risk taker, and you refuse to live up to your potential. But sometimes you make good choices."

I didn't know I was going to use this line as a motif when I wrote it for the first time here. But as soon as I did, I thought, that will be the ending line--Faith saying, "Sometimes I do make good choices." So it was here that I knew where and how the story would end. Because I knew that, I also knew I'd have to work this line in on several other occasions (that's the Rule of Three). Of course, doing that is heavy-handed, so the obvious solution was to get Anya to say it every single time. Giving Anya a motif is simplicity itself!

Faith brushed the words aside. Anya insisted on talking about her "choices" every time she came to the drop-in centre. She looked at it as just another way of paying her way. Listening to lectures edged out handing over cash, but not by much. "Come on, Tar, I'll show you around."

She'd kept hold of Tara's hand through all this, even though her palm was damp. Nervous, probably. "This is a nice place," she said. "There are others, but Anya's better than most of those fucktards. No last names, no paperwork. Not if you don't want."

Fucktards. I love that word, but so rarely get a chance to use it. Probably the "no last names, no paperwork" thing is bullshit (I should know, I work at a place like this, and there is paperwork for EVERYTHING) but I think either Anya would buck the rules and get away with it, or else I have creative license.

They found the room and the sheets. Faith threw them on the bed but Tara insisted on hospital corners.

Characterization through bed-making! My mom taught me hospital corners when I was, like, five. It stuck. I imagine Tara and her mom making their menfolks' beds together--like Whoopi Goldberg in "Corrina, Corrina", when she lofts the sheet up and it drifts down and settles perfectly centered on the bed.

Faith left her to it. She'd just mess the whole thing up. She sat on a chair near the window, propped back on two legs, and tried to keep her fingers still. When Anya said "no drugs", that included smoking. She was soft when it came to letting people in, but she was just as hard when it came to kicking them out. So Faith fidgeted and watched Tara. Really watched her, because Tara was pretty in a way that didn't hit you right away. It sort of snuck up on you. After a while you realized she was beautiful and you couldn't understand why you'd thought she was nothing much before.

My relationship with Amber Benson in a nutshell.

Doing a simple chore like making a bed, Tara was confident and graceful--she didn't try to erase herself the way she had in the diner, or when Faith had first started yelling and banging on Anya's door.

The idea of 'erasing herself' is a big thing about the way I characterize Tara. Also, this was when I kind of remembered the request I was writing and realized Faith had to "notice Tara's gentleness." Okay, so straight in with the obvious description, then! Subtlety is for the weak!

"You wanna tell me about it?" Faith asked, while Tara was busy getting the top sheet to lie perfectly even.

Faith likes to ambush people with the truth. Canonically she does it to Buffy all the time (the whole hungry and horny thing, sleeping with Xander, etc.)

She stopped and turned to face Faith, still kneeling on the floor. "Tell you about what?" she asked. Not a trace of stammer. Faith wondered how many other people Tara brought out the steel for. She was like a beaten puppy, but she could still show teeth.

Faith shrugged. She didn't want anyone asking about her life story, so there was no reason to make Tara all defensive. Everyone had secrets. Maybe she'd figured Tara was the type to talk, to want to get it all out, maybe cry like they did on Oprah

My characters are all uniformly terrified of being dragged on to Oprah or Dr. Phil to explain their interpersonal issues. This is about the fourth fic in which there's a reference like this. Projecting, much?

or those little group-therapy sessions Anya held every evening. Faith had seen them, hugging and gulping back sobs and making a big deal about their problems. She wasn't here that often, but seeing that shit always made her want to leave again. So Tara didn't want to talk. Neither did she, really.

Faith ambushes others with the truth as a defensive mechanism--because she doesn't want to talk about her own problems.

"I'm gonna find my couch, then," she said, thumping the chair down and heading for the door. "All the comforts of home."

"It's nothing like home," Tara said, soft but vicious. She turned back to the sheets and started stuffing them under the mattress, just so, perfect folds.

Faith stood in the doorway, her hands stuffed into her pockets. "Yeah," she said, after a moment, while Tara tucked and smoothed. "I know."

I think this is the sort of moment you can't get without canon background: that both Tara's and Faith's home lives were shitty. Because of that ep where we meet Tara's family, this is all very clear. In a non-fic story, you could probably imply a lot with a simple exchange like this, but you'd need to come right out and say it later on.

Tara brushed the sheet again, getting rid of imaginary wrinkles. "Thank you for bringing me here, Faith." She looked up. Her eyes were amazingly blue, and clear, and direct.

Faith dropped her gaze, mumbled "you're welcome," and closed the door. She frowned at it for a long moment, feeling her stomach twist somehow. She tensed, her hands turning to fists. She wanted to hit something, just kick the place apart, and she had no idea why. Fuck.

When I wrote this line, I knew specifically what Faith was angry about, but now I forget. She's frustrated, and I understand that, and Faith is the type to lash out in anger rather than try to figure out why. But I used to know exactly what her problem is, and now I've forgotten. That's annoying.

She clattered down the stairs and hoped she ruined somebody's good dreams. In the common room, there was a clatter of claws on tile, and two beagles came scrambling in from the kitchen to jump up on her. "Hey, guys," Faith said, letting them slobber on her hand. Anya was so annoyingly literal when it came to naming the centre's pets. Faith scratched behind Fido's ears until he went wriggly and wild. Rover's tail thrashed, waiting for his turn. Then they both jumped up on the couch.

"We're full," Faith told them, but when she lay down and they twined around her legs, she let them stay.

Foreshadowing, of course, but also an echo of Anya allowing her and Tara in.

The best thing about the drop in centre was how it never ran out of hot water.

People are forever running out of hot water in fics. Why?

The other occupants might ram the door down and strangle you if you took too long, but you never had to jump out of the shower cursing because all of a sudden the Arctic ocean was cascading down your back.

Faith stayed for a long time. She could sleep like a log when she wanted, and breakfast was over and done, so there wasn't much competition. She wanted to get out of here pretty soon, though. If she hung around too long, Anya would bug her about joining the job search seminar or the high school equivalency class. No thanks. She could hang out, find a way to pass the time before the clubs opened. She didn't give up her Friday nights.

She'd liberated a few of her clothes from Anya's storage space,

This is because Faith has no home, so where does she keep her stuff? I wanted her to have more than one set of clothes, but I had no idea where she kept them if she lives on the street. There's a lot here that's very unrealistic, as far as being homeless is concerned. Faith has sold herself, but she's not disease-ridden or hooked on drugs. She has no home but she is apparently somewhat sheveled and kempt. But we ignore that! And we move on!

left here the last time she'd breezed through. The clean jeans she'd snagged were nearly a write off, but there were a few more good times left in them. There was a dime-sized hole just under one asscheek that was growing every time she pulled them on, but it wasn't like she'd had any complaints about that. Faith dumped the stuff she'd been wearing in the hamper and hoped they'd still be there the next time she needed them.

She has the same faith in Anya's laundry system that I have in my neat sidestepping around plot holes.

Next order of business was the search for food. The kitchen smelled like dishsoap and bacon. Faith stuck her head in and saw Tara scrubbing plates. She concentrated on each dish like she was washing priceless china instead of tupperware.

I love that Tara washes dishes this way. She's a very careful person. In canon, it manifests as the way she's in tune with her magic and Willow isn't. What it really is, is a care for people, and it extends to the world around her.

"Hey," Faith said, grinning at her view. Looked like Anya had gone through the leftover clothes for Tara. Man, she looked good. The fuzzy-soft sweater was too big, and the faded jeans too small. Just made you want to run your hands over everything.

Tara jumped a foot and turned around with a squeak. Her eyes were wide, and she held her breath, looking down. "F-Faith," she said, letting her breath go. "Y-y-you s-startled me."

Tara's stutter is interesting to write. I try to keep which consonants she has trouble with constant. She stutters more when she's nervous, of course, but it annoys me when people write her as perfectly articulate and then add "she stuttered". I follow the Stephen King school of thought from "It". Write the stutter like a dialect, but try not to do it so much that it gets annoying for the reader. (On the other hand, I find writing dialects annoying, like Doyle being Irish or whatever. In those cases, I prefer them written normally, then with a beat like "with the hint of brogue" or whathaveyou. As long as you don't overuse the word "brogue", because, ugh.) And this has been a trip through my hypocritical brain.

"Jeez, sorry." Faith stayed by the door, uncertainly, not sure if she wanted to go busting into the kitchen after half killing Tara with a heart attack. Tara looked so small, even though she was a shade taller than Faith, and more solidly built.

Thumbing my nose at people who make Xander a girly-man and Spike a towering, muscular giant. So often, Faith is way taller than she should be, and Buffy is way shorter. Their height difference is miniscule, at best. Tara is probably taller than Faith.

She was doing that erasing thing again, cowering back against the sink like she expected to get hit for being surprised. Hell, she probably did expect it. People whose lives were all sunshine and roses didn't turn up crying in L.A. diners in the middle of the night.

Faith walked into the room carefully, trying not to make any sudden moves. She started opening cupboards at random, looking for whatever seemed interesting. "Anya put you to work already," she offered, in case Tara wanted to pretend everything was fine.

Faith's the one who always gives out these 'opportunities' to pretend everything is okay. Tara rarely takes them. It's another unreliable narrator thing.

Tara relaxed slowly. She grabbed a cloth and wiped up the soapy water that had spilled when she jumped. "I-it's the least I can do," she said, going back to the dishes. "She's letting me stay if I w-want to. She says she can help me find a job."

"So how are you gonna repay me?" Faith asked, with a hint of a leer. "I don't recommend this place to just anybody, y'know."

Tara blushed. Faith could only see a small crescent of her face, turned slightly towards her,

I love this perspective Faith has--I wish I had a picture of the way Tara's face is turned slightly. There's a window in front of her, and she's sunlit and brilliant. The best analog would be Tara turning to Willow when she says, "But I am. Yours." But Tara doesn't believe that Faith could possibly be hitting on her, so the smile is sort of "yeah right"ish.

the rest of her attention on the dishes. Jeez, Tara was really gorgeous, in such a gentle way that every time you noticed it hit you as hard as the first time. Tara's hands paused, then continued, scrubbing and rinsing. "I had a girlfriend back home," she said.

I knew her girlfriend back home was Buffy. Buffy was also in the request, and this is me trying to tell the world that Buffy/Tara is, like OMG OTP!!!eleventy-one!

Faith hopped up on the counter behind Tara with the box of Lucky Charms she'd found. "Yeah?" she said, digging out a handful and shoving them in her mouth. "What's her name?"

"Buffy."

Faith choked through her Lucky Charms. "That's a name?"

Cliché, but I wanted their conversation to be longer so that Faith would have a chance to eat her breakfast. This bit was added later.

Tara set a plate down and started on the next. "Yes." Whispered, but firm. So, okay. No laughing at the girlfriend's name.

Faith crunched tiny marshmallows, refined sugar hitting her system and waking her up. Better than coffee. After a pause, she asked, "What was she like?"

"She was...she seemed really strong," Tara said. "Everyone loved her. She was...like sunshine. Friendly and...not like me."

"Not like you isn't exactly a compliment," Faith said. She swung her legs, thudding her heels against the drawers beneath her.

"I--th-thanks." Tara put the last dish down and turned around. "I wanted to tell. Even though...but she didn't. She didn't want her friends to know."

Buffy is a bitch. God love 'er, but she is. Plus, this is Hemery-era Buffy. She's not a Slayer, so she hasn't learned those lessons. This is the Buffy-that-would-have-been, if canon wasn't.

Faith rolled her eyes. She knew the type. Give her five minutes with them in an alley outside a bar, and they'd be begging for it, but go back inside and they'd push her away because someone might see.

The core of every Faith/Buffy fic ever written.

They looked like they could handle anything, but give them one tiny thing that people could talk about behind their backs, and they crumbled. Faith sometimes hated the guys she fucked, or the reasons she had to, but girls who turned cold like that were worse. Made her hate herself, just because she didn't care who saw. Tara didn't deserve that. Faith had just met her and she knew that. "That sucks," she said. "What a bitch."

"That's w-what I thought. So I told her it was over...I went to say goodbye." Tara crossed her arms and blinked back tears. "And she was right. My brother saw us... He w-would have told my father."

Faith put the cereal box down, suddenly cold. Her father. "And that's why..."

Human AU or no, this is still Jossverse. Everyone has father issues. In this 'verse, Faith was never rescued from her father by her Watcher, of course.

Tara met her eyes. "Yeah."

Faith nodded slowly. "Okay." She brushed one foot against the outside of Tara's thigh and smiled. "So...you wanna go out tonight?"

Faith doesn't like the heavy stuff. Tara has just opened up to her more than she would to anyone else, and Faith wants to push it aside for their date. In Tara's mind, she agrees to the date because Faith took her confession well, and was sympathetic. In Faith's mind, she sort of squirmed and was uncomfortable for a while, but Tara is hot, so she asks her out and is pretty sure she'll get lucky.

It was the first time she'd seen Tara's full smile, joyful and mischievous. "It's the least I can do."

The club was always loud and crowded, two things Faith liked most about it. It was close to the drop-in centre, and women didn't pay cover every second Friday,

More improbable ways I get around the fact that Faith HAS NO MONEY.

which helped, too. The bass thudded hard and insistent. Tara was looking doubtful, but Faith pulled her inside and then leaned close to yell in her ear, "Trust me!"

Like in Aladdin, before the magic carpet ride.

Tara eyed the dancers and the people at the bar. She said, "I do. But all these other people..." Somehow her voice managed to carry above the din, even though she didn't shout.

Faith tugged her towards the dancefloor. They'd found a shirt for Tara that was less with the fuzzy and more with the cleavage. Faith had growled approval when she finally coaxed Tara out of her room, and since then Tara had been wearing it well, not flinching much or trying to vanish from sight. It wasn't the sort of shirt you disappeared in--more the sort other people wished would disappear off you. Just to Faith's taste, in other words.

The music thrummed through her body and Faith wanted to let go into the strength of the beat. Tara didn't look like she knew how to dance like that, how the rhythm could take your whole body over. Before, Tara probably swayed to awkward slowdances or stayed near the wall, the punch, the bathroom line.

Like me, in other words.

Faith was more than willing to teach her what she'd missed.

"Come on!" she yelled, reckless, and this time she took Tara by the belt loops, pulling her way too close for comfort. Comfort was the last thing she needed. Hard and strong and a thigh between her legs, hands on hips, grinding closer. Yeah. Just like that.

Tara moved cautiously at first, but Faith let her hands slide lower and showed her how it was done.

Tara leaned forward, her lips close to Faith's ear. "A-are you sure..."

"Yeah," Faith said, letting her voice go husky. "Yeah. Come on. You're having fun, right?"

"Yes..."

"Don't worry. Nobody here cares." Faith wiggled her eyebrows, a dare, and pushed close again. "Besides, you look amazing."

Tara turned bright red and ducked her head. "I d-don't--"

"I thought you trusted me?"

Tara glanced up, smiling despite herself. "Yeah."

"Then you look amazing."

Everyone and their cousin has used this dialogue. But it works. Also, foreshadowing that Faith's expecting more out of this than Tara is.

Tara didn't answer, but the last of her tension melted away, and she really danced. Faith breathed in and held it for a moment, until she was dizzy and the lights swam around them, and let it out so slowly it hurt. Tara's blush faded, then returned as she flushed from the heat and the effort and the press of Faith's leg between hers. She tossed her head, flinging out her hair, eyes closed. Giving herself up--to the music, to Faith.

They danced to the point of exhaustion, accepted free drinks from guys who thought they were just putting on a show, and let the night flow past around them. It was fucking beautiful, one of the best nights Faith had ever had, and it wouldn't be the first time she'd sneaked around Anya's no-screwing rule.

More foreshadowing, which is why I love being so tight in Faith's POV here. I considered switching it around, earlier--doing the drop-in centre scene in Tara's POV--but then I preferred the consistency for a one-off story. In WiPs I'm more likely to switch it around, and if it's truly epic, I might even use a POV that isn't one of the main characters'.

Faith could have stayed there all night, reveling in the lights, the music, but she was impatient and getting hornier all the time. When she jerked her head towards the exit, Tara nodded, and they squirmed through the crowd to escape. The streets were damp and cool, and taxis hissed past them through puddles as they walked home.

I like the hissing sound of cars after rainstorms--so mysteriouschillydark.

Tara was tipsy and giggling. Faith had pushed the first drink into her hand, insisting the random guy who bought it meant it for her, and that it was bad manners to refuse. After that, Tara hadn't said no, and accepted the drinks with grave formality

While barely containing her laughter, really.

while turning her backs on the boys as soon as she could. Faith laughed while Tara tripped over cracks in the sidewalk, and tried to hold her up.

A block from the centre, Tara stumbled right into her arms, and Faith gave up waiting and kissed her.

I agonized over this first kiss. I got this far and couldn't get it started. It was annoying, so I gave up on build-up and just went with the much easier "and she kissed her". Because I'm the author, dammit! Also, it's Faith. That excuses a lot, in abrupt sex scenes.

Tara hummed with pleasure and kissed her back, leaning in, and God, she was so soft. Lips and breasts pressing against Faith's. How long since...whatshername?

My Faith is bi, but she prefers women slightly--enough that although she fucks guys for money, she only fucks women for fun.

Long enough to forget. Too long.

"Jesus, Tara..." Faith muttered, and pushed her against the brick wall behind them. She traced Tara's lips with her tongue, kissing her deeper, pressing a little until Tara's mouth melted open under hers. She tasted of citrus and alcohol. Her hair smelled like sweat and bar-smoke and fresh rain.

Given the "Buffy = vanilla" cliché, I'm always trying to figure out exactly what people smell like. Often it's not necessarily a good smell--I usually try to mix in a little BO, especially after all the dancing and drinking these girls have done. I mean, they're probably a little rank. I hate smoky smelling people right after leaving a bar. Probably for Faith that's not a problem.

Fuck, she was hot, and who cared that the drop-in centre was a hundred feet away? The street was empty. Inside, there'd be people to listen, to tattle...and they were here now. Tara moaned a bit, her hands circling Faith's waist loosely. Faith kissed her harder, running a hand around from Tara's hip to the crotch of her jeans. Yeah. Yeah.

Tara pulled away from the kiss, letting her head drop back. "Hey--"

And here's where the story's main conflict cuts in. It was a wonderful fight to write, because it had been in my head for literally months, though not exactly in this format. But there's action and dialogue and it hurts. This part came out of my fingers all in one rush, unlike other bits that fought me the whole way.

"Hmm?" Faith wasn't really listening. She kissed Tara's neck, licking her way down to her collarbone, the skin exposed by her shirt. Her hand was busy on Tara's fly.

"F-Faith--" Tara took her wrist and held it. "Wait..."

Faith stopped and let Tara push her hand away. "You wanna get inside?"

"No...I mean, y-yes." Tara pushed away from the wall, keeping one hand on the bricks to hold herself steady. "But--"

"Don't worry about Anya." Faith pulled Tara towards her, so that she could lean on her while they walked. "She's not gonna kick you out or anything."

"That's not...Faith..." Tara's shoulders were tight under her arm. "I don't...I don't want to, uh, d-do this."

Faith stopped short, letting go of Tara and stepping back. Tara crossed her arms and huddled into herself, as if she was cold, her long hair falling in front of her face like a veil. "What?"

"I...it's too s-soon..."

"Tara, come on." Faith stepped closer, reaching out a hand. Tara shrugged it away. Faith backed off again, frustrated and bewildered. "I like you, you like me, so what's the fucking problem?"

"I j-j-just...i-it's..." Tara's mouth worked, but she couldn't get the words out.

"Then why the fuck did you go out with me?"

"T-to have f-fun--I thought it was j-just a date."

"It was a date!" Faith threw up her hands. "It is a date."

Tara shook her head, then started walking for the centre, making herself as small as possible.

This entire scene was originally supposed to go in a Buffy/Tara story I haven't written yet. In that story, Buffy's on the rebound from Faith, and so she's kind of doing the Parker thing, except with Tara. It fits much better here--Faith is far more likely to take advantage of someone, without even realizing that's what she's doing. Tara is shocked, and drunk, and can't articulate what's wrong, and Faith is totally unable to understand what's wrong. This is where their character similarities diverge. They've both had tough lives, abusive fathers, whatever--but Tara's mom taught her what loving someone entails.

Faith gave a disgusted snort and turned away. Going back to the drop-in centre was the last thing she wanted to do. "Fucking tease," she yelled, to no one really. She was just worked up, angry as hell, and she'd been having such a good time and now it was like dirt.

This is another place I'm glad we're in Faith's POV, because otherwise this would be going way too far. The fact that she yells "to no one, really" and that we see that she's mostly disappointed and ashamed, with "and now it was like dirt", allows it to be a softer insult. I don't think Tara should forgive her so quickly for this, but because the reader can see that it's not directed anger, it's just frustration, makes it okay, I think.

"F-Faith!"

Faith spun around. "What? I thought you wanted someone who didn't care about being seen with you!" She kept yelling, because the words were there, and who gave a shit, anyway? Tara was disappearing right in front of her, but she didn't care. "You were having enough fun back there, but now you're gonna shut it off, right? Like I'm not good enough, or what?"

This is her big fear, of course. It's also how she reacts to Buffy in canon.

Tara just kept walking.

Because she's just that strong, which is the amazing thing. She left her family the day before, Faith is the only person she knows, and she's willing to sever all ties if Faith is going to be no better than what she left behind.

Faith followed her, still not believing it, really, until Tara stood on the steps of the drop-in centre and started opening the door with the key Anya had lent her.

More reality issues with Anya lending her a key. Sigh.

Faith glared at her back, trying to figure out where the fuck they'd gone wrong.

"I thought you trusted me," she said. It had been a joke, before. Because no one ever had, really, until Tara. Why should they, right? No reason, no reason at all.

Here's the start of Faith's turning point--she realizes she wants to be worthy of someone's trust, when before all she wanted was her independence.

Tara glanced over her shoulder. Bright blue eyes that had been so happy earlier. "I thought so, too," she said, and slipped inside.

"Faith!" Anya stood in front of her, a clipboard in her hand, and a determinedly cheerful smile plastered on her face. "My office. Now."

I love determinedly cheerful Anya.

"Fuck off." Faith kept her boots on the coffee table and stared through Anya's midsection. She'd come back, in the end, because there wasn't anywhere else to go, and at least here there was a lumpy sofa with her name on it. On the T.V. behind Anya, a raspy yelling guy was trying to sell her some funky bleach. Faith tried to care deeply about bleach.

This is a real commercial with a real guy who yells about bleach. He's even more annoying than the Canadian Tire shill with his fucking fence pressure washer, but that's a rant for another day.

"You're sleeping on my couch. You're on my list as a resident here. Therefore, I have scheduled a one-on-one counselling session for you."

More me-making-up-procedures in order to advance the plot. This scene was another "landmark" of the fic--Anya kicks Faith's ass right back to Tara. In this story, Anya takes the place of Anne from Angel--the girl who was Lily and Chanterelle, you know who I mean. Gunn's Anne. But Anya is far more kick-ass in the role.

Anya prodded Faith's toe with her pen. "You'll talk about your problems and I'll pretend to listen and maybe even care. Then we'll go back to ignoring each other. I can convince rich guilty liberals to give me money, and you can go back to destroying your life."

Anya still has all her lusts: money, and orgasms. I didn't manage to work bunnies in, though.

Faith looked up. "You're not helping anyone, you know. You just want that stupid fundraising trophy to stay in your office."

Anya's bright smile never faltered. "Did I say anything about helping?" she asked matter-of-factly.

Anya is fundamentally an extremely helpful person. When she was a vengeance demon, it wasn't because she liked the vengeance (though that was a bonus), it was that she wanted to help scorned women. Anya and Faith both hate glossing over the truth with tact, but they aren't deliberately hurtful with it the way early Cordelia was. I kind of love their relationship as friends; that's another thing I don't write too often--friendship. I'm too caught up in the romance to give people confidantes.

"No. Besides, you've done your best to convince me you're beyond help. And I don't care about the trophy. The money, on the other hand...and the annual awards buffet--they have nothing but shrimp, but it's a good place to be if you happen to like shrimp..."

Another fun canon reference.

"You're not going to shut up unless I come with you, are you?"

"We can talk about your problems right here just as easily. I don't care who knows. You don't either, so that should work out fine." Anya consulted her clipboard. "So, you and Tara were out past curfew last night..."

Faith glared at Anya. Anya clicked her penpoint, in, out, in, out, and raised her eyebrows.

I love this vision of Anya clicking her penpoint while having a Dirty Harry stare-down with Faith.

"Fuck." Faith pushed herself to her feet and shoved her hands in her pockets. "Let's go."

"You see? You're perfectly capable of making good choices." Triumphant, Anya led the way to her office and sat primly in the chair behind the desk, clasping her hands in front of her and leaning forward. Faith dropped into the chair across from her, dangling one leg over the arm. She knew how she looked. Guidance counsellors from grades five through eight had told her a thousand times. Sullen. Uncooperative. Sulky. So what. She didn't want to be here and it was Anya's fucking job. She had an uncrackable smile, but that didn't mean she cared. Even if she did, nothing was going to get fixed any time soon.

The 'uncrackable smile' comes from "The Twinkie Squad", by Gordon Korman; the 'choices' thing comes from my job. We're trying to teach the kids that if they do their math homework, then they can go out for recess. If not, they sit in the time-out room. They're very slow at making the connection, especially when they're frustrated, but mainly what we're trying to show is that we're not punishing them--rather, their choices have consequences. And that's why I chose to set the fic here, really: because my job is basically Anya's. I felt like we had this connection.

"Sometimes I feel like I've been doing this for centuries," Anya said thoughtfully, gazing somewhere to the left of Faith. "My job satisfaction isn't the highest. I keep telling them to get rid of the non in 'non-profit organization', but no one listens."

More canon: Anya is a thousand years old.

"I thought we were here to talk about my problems."

Anya arched an eyebrow. "I thought you didn't have any problems. You seem to like the way your life is going."

Faith rolled her eyes. "Nice try."

"So you're not happy. Who would be, in your place? No home, nothing to do but 'hang', having indiscriminate sex with whoever offers...well...it can't be all bad. But unsafe."

I was trying to stop portraying Faith's homeless, prostituting life as glamourous. She hasn't really suffered from being homeless in this fic, has she? It's very Pretty Woman, with Tara cast as Richard Gere. Which is...an unsettling visual. Let us never speak of it again.

Faith glared. "Those aren't my problems."

"Right." Anya focused on her, narrowing her eyes. "Your problem is that you don't know when someone is trying to help you."

"Oh, like you?" Faith asked. She started kicking her leg, wondering when she could get out of here. She didn't need the fucking couch.

"No. Like Tara."

Faith clenched her jaw and studied the floor.

"I spoke with her this morning."

Silence.

Usually I try to avoid saying "silence"--it's weak writing--I should write what you can hear, not what you can't.

Anya sighed. "Orgasms are a wonderful way to connect with people. But not the only way."

"You're getting pretty fucking preachy," Faith spat. Tara wasn't anybody's business but hers. And anyway, Faith didn't need her. So what if she didn't want to screw? There were plenty of people in the world who'd give their right arm to be with her.

Like me! Call me, Eliza!

"You're afraid of her," Anya said blithely.

Specifically, she's afraid of the intimacy that Tara represents.

Faith thumped her feet to the floor. "I thought you were supposed to make me feel better."

"I don't know where you're getting all these expectations. I said I would listen."

"You're not doing much of that."

Anya steepled her fingers thoughtfully. "Loving someone is a very scary thing. They can hurt you--leave you, or die, or change. It takes a very strong person to be in love."

Of course, these are all issues that Anya had with Xander in canon.

"What are you saying, that I'm in love with her?" Faith jerked to her feet and started pacing. "That's crazy. We met yesterday! It was just one date, for fuck's sake."

"You're not going to let it be anything more, though. You're going to push her away." Anya shook her head. "That's pretty stupid, considering how much she seems to like you. God knows why."

In a one-off story like this, I need to get the conflict resolved quickly. This is a bit of a talking head scene, with me as Anya, basically saying what we all know. She plays the same role in canon, so I can accept that.

Faith paused and eyed Anya. "Thanks so much."

"I try." Anya smiled again. "You hate being vulnerable, you're too tough to need anybody, and you think if you fell in love then you'd have to change. But, sometimes, you make good choices."

Choices. Right. It always came back to that. Faith gave a derisive snort. "One choice isn't going to make my life any better."

Sherryl Jordan, "A Time Of Darkness": "The greatest things in this world are begun by an insignificant act. A smile begets a marriage, a loving act begets a tribe, a dream can alter history."

"True. Little choices, little consequences. Right now: apologise to Tara. Or don't." Anya glanced at her watch. "We'll talk about that next time, though."

Faith opened her mouth to ask how the hell she was supposed to apologise, but Anya raised a hand to stop her. She flicked her fingers at Faith, shooing her from the office.

Faith went, leaving Anya with a shammy in hand, polishing her fundraising trophy.

The trophy is a large, ornate golden cup with two handles. Sometimes, Anya talks to it. It wasn't here when this scene started, but it wound up being an excellent way to end it.

"Hey."

Conscious of my tendency to start scenes with description, I purposefully tried to avoid that here.

"Hello, Faith."

Faith looked out the window, to the stuff on the dresser, anywhere but at Tara. She'd had plenty of times when she wanted to disappear, too, back in Boston. But then she figured she'd get powerful and show everyone that there was no way they could get rid of her. So she went bigger-than-life, rough and bad and obvious, at least, so they couldn't ignore her. And when her dad couldn't ignore her any more he beat her up and kicked her out.

This is season three, writ small, except with "Buffy" instead of "her dad".

So maybe erasing yourself was easier. If no one saw you then you weren't in shit with them. Just that easy.

"How's it going?"

Tara's lips quirked into something that was almost a smile. "Not too badly."

"Good." Faith tapped on the doorframe. "Great. Okay. Well. Keep it up." She shifted from one foot to the other. "I'll see ya, I guess." She moved away from the door.

"Faith...y-you can come in if you want." Tara pushed the desk chair at her, and took a seat on the bed.

Faith took a deep breath and went in, turning the chair around and straddling it. Tara smiled slightly, her hands folded in her lap. They looked soft. Gentle. Strange how all Faith could see now was the steel she knew was underneath. The sort that let Tara leave home instead of letting her dad rain shit down on her for liking girls. The way she wouldn't let you do anything if she thought it was wrong. Not by saying anything or lecturing, even, but just by letting you know she'd be disappointed if you did.

Plus she was an amazing kisser.

I'm sorry I yelled at you. Was that so hard to say? I'm sorry I was such a bitch. I'm sorry I called you names.

At first, I had Faith actually saying these things, but it seemed OOC for her to apologise that easily.

Faith knew she fucked up, so it shouldn't be so tough to apologise. But the words stuck in her throat. She didn't want to be wrong. I'm sorry I pushed you. She didn't want to admit that. She didn't want to be that person.

At first I thought I didn't have an external and an internal plot, the way I usually do, because it's human AU. Normally, the external plot is vampires/spells/demons, and the inner plot is the romance. Here, the inner plot is still the romance, but I just realized that the external plot is actually Faith's self-esteem issues--how she doesn't want to "be that person". It's still quite internal as a conflict, but it's what generates the external conflict of the story. Huh. Whaddaya know.

"Faith, I'm sorry I led you on." Tara picked at the loose threads in her holed jeans. "I-I've never d-danced like that, and the drinking..."

Oh, jeez, this wasn't supposed to be happening.

It really wasn't. This was another place where I couldn't figure out who said what next. So Tara spoke up. It worked, so I kept it.

Tara wasn't supposed to be sorry. This wasn't her fault. None of it was. Faith wanted to curl up and be invisible, more than ever.

"And when you k-kissed me, I--I th-thought..." Tara tilted her head and touched Faith's hand, resting on the back of the chair. "Sweetie...haven't you ever just kissed someone? Just...to kiss them?"

This is another line from my unwritten Buffy/Tara scene.

No. That answer was easy. Always someone had been trying to go further, to get something out of it.

That is the saddest thing of all about Faith, I think.

Tara must have seen that on her face, because her eyes widened. "Oh, Faith." She said it so softly, like maybe she cared after all. After everything.

Faith felt her throat close and go tight, like someone was pressing, cutting off her breath. She recognised it, hated it. She didn't cry. Not ever. Not her.

Not since Boston.

And suddenly she was beside Tara on the bed, and Tara was stroking her hair, holding her so fucking tight. How did that work? How was Tara suddenly the strong one?

This is another bit where I had no idea how to segue. I'm not a fan of "and then suddenly!", but I think it works here because Faith is distraught; besides, it works like abruptly going into present-tense (the action is much more right now), but without actually changing tenses.

And Tara kissed her, and it was so different. A whisper of lips against hers. Faith wanted to taste her, but Tara moved away, then closer again, with small closed-mouth kisses, brushing like butterfly wings. It felt so warm, like trust. Just a touch that said it was all right not to want more. This was comfort, compassion. Faith tried to relax, not to push or press, but to let Tara be in charge. It was hard. Her hands were restless and she didn't know where to put them, and her hips lifted instinctively but Tara gently pressed them down.

More from that unwritten Buffy/Tara. That will have to change now, because of this, but this was good practice.

It was slow, and sweet, and it ended way too soon.

Faith opened her eyes to see Tara half beside, half above her. When exactly they'd lain down she didn't know. Didn't really care.

"Now what?" she asked.

"Now...nothing," Tara answered. "That's it. Just kissing."

"I mean...I'm sorry," Faith said, because it was simple; she knew she was forgiven. "I'm sorry."

She kissed Tara back, just kissing, lips and tongues and teeth. Slow. She'd never done slow before. She let go, and backed away, and Tara smiled. She brushed Faith's hair back, fingertips like feathers.

"I know," she said. "Thank you."

As a scene-ender, I like this line the best out of all of them in the story.

Here's where the ellipse really shows a time-passage. It was one week, but then that didn't seem long enough, so I went with two weeks. This scene is much different, too, in that it's not immediate-action, but mostly flashback, interspersed with present.

Anya eyed her sideways, snickering, when Faith was still at the drop-in centre two weeks later and, more than that, still following all the rules. Faith tried to stare her down, but she'd lost the power of her death glare at some point and she couldn't quite get the anger back.

Faith was pretty sure that Tara had some kind of magic about her,

Canon reference.

because this staying in one spot thing had never been what she was about. Now, though, she stayed and she was pretty damn happy about it. She took over walking Rover and Fido, because Tara gave her little wounded glances at chore sign up time if she didn't pick something. She fidgeted through the group therapy sessions and had to pinch herself awake in the resume writing class, but she stayed.

And in the afternoons, if there was nothing else to do, she'd follow Tara up to her room. Anya stared pointedly and heaved huge, long-suffering sighs, but Faith just smirked and ignored her. Rules were rules, but once you knew how they bent, you could shape them how you liked. Besides, Tara and Anya talked every day, long involved conversations that made sense to the two of them if no one else. So Anya probably knew that Faith wasn't getting her fraternization freak on. Not yet.

"Not yet," Tara would say, with a teasing smile,

Here's where I first do a flashback-to-present kind of a jump, from internal monologue to dialogue. I liked that repetition.

and Faith had learned to let it go, to enjoy what she got, to take it for what it was. The smallest kiss or touch from Tara felt better than a hundred alley-fucks, so why fight it?

There were a lot of things she wasn't fighting anymore. Sometimes Faith wanted to go out and trash some bar just for the action of it, finding a calm in movement that she didn't really understand. She was afraid of sitting still. You were safe if you could move--it was the only way you knew you were free. Tara could sit without moving except to breathe, for hours it seemed, and watching her Faith didn't know if she envied that or not. But she always pushed down the urge to break away. She watched Tara and learned stillness, and when she couldn't stand it a moment longer, she whistled up Fido and Rover and took them running.

She always came back, and Tara was always there.

They could kiss in front of anybody, for no reason at all. The whole centre knew. Faith heard a few people whispering "fucking dyke" behind her back but she'd heard worse. Felt worse. Those words couldn't touch her now.

Tara showed her how to be strong by giving in.

This is a sex scene I've had in mind for months. Again, it's from that unwritten Buffy/Tara. And, overshare, but it's because I find that orgasms are more intense if I relax into them and let them happen, rather than tensing up. So that's what Tara is teaching Faith.

"Relax," she whispered into Faith's collarbone, her hands moving down her arms in long, massaging strokes. Her tongue darted out and slipped under the v-collar of Faith's shirt, far enough to find the curve of her breast. "You're so tense."

"Jesus, Tar, of course I'm fucking tense, when you're doing--uhn--that..."

Tara let out a hushed breath, like laughter. "Hmm, am I making you this tight? You need a good masseuse."

"Nah, I need you." And Faith rolled on top of her, tracing the side of her throat with delicate nips. Tara moaned, and lifted her chin, encouraging Faith to go further. "You like this...?"

"Yes...Faith..." Tara opened her eyes, and they were so full of trust, deep and dark as twilight skies. "Let me take this off."

"Yeah?" Faith rested her hands on Tara's hips, then slipped her fingers higher, trailing over the smooth skin of her stomach, pushing the shirt up. Tara half sat up and pulled it over her head, then lay back, smiling in the lazy, joyful way she had. Letting Faith know she was completely in her hands.

This is one of the easiest sex scenes I've ever written. The dialogue and action were written together, rather than other scenes I've done where I wrote action first, then came back and interspersed the appropriate dialogue. This was following "Je me souviens", where I applied my lessons in using dialogue during sex. There, it was about learning; here, it was about applying. I was actually surprised at how quickly this scene went. From here to the end of the story, I wrote in only an hour, with no revisions. (Ah, deadlines!)

Faith dipped her head to place kisses on Tara's stomach, holding her still with her hands. She didn't have Tara's instinct for the tender touch, the light strokes rather than hard, urgent contact. She sucked at the curve of Tara's belly, nibbling and licking, leaving marks where she passed. Tara kneaded her shoulders, tiny whimpers exploding from her lips as Faith mapped the sensitive places on her body. Faith lifted her head, pushing her hair over her shoulder so that it didn't fall between them. She tucked a finger under Tara's bra strap and tugged. "What about this?"

Tara smiled. "All right." She pushed up from the bed and kissed Faith, so deeply it felt like she was breathing her breath. Faith kissed her back until she was dizzy. She didn't rush, but she guided Tara to the tiny spaces of her mouth that flooded her with electricity. With one hand she reached behind Tara and unhooked the bra; with the other she held Tara close until the kiss drew out and ended of its own accord and Tara was half naked beneath her.

"You're fucking beautiful." They'd never gone this far and suddenly Faith didn't know what to do, like in two weeks she'd forgotten how to fuck, where to go next with lips and fingers.

Or maybe she'd just never learned whatever it was they were doing now.

The difference between fucking and making love, I mean.

"Y-you're overdressed," Tara said with a hint of her stutter. It was the first time she'd hesitated while they were together, and Faith knew she was nervous, too.

"You figure?" she asked, sweeping her fingers over Tara's belly, then higher, until her palms brushed over Tara's nipples.

"Y-yess--" Tara brought both hands up to cup Faith's cheeks, and kissed her again. "I want to see you."

"Okay." Faith pulled her t-shirt off, glad she hadn't bothered with a bra today, and tossed it to the floor. Tara's face glowed beneath her, blushing a gorgeous shade of red.

"Faith...lay down, sweetie."

I'm not sure I like 'sweetie' here, but I'm not sure what other endearments Tara uses. I might change this if I edited.

Faith raised her eyebrows but did as she was told. Tara touched her lips to her temple, the point of her shoulder, the dip beneath her breast. Faith's pulse hammered a mile a minute, seeming to center on each spot Tara kissed. Tara explored her body, as calm and careful as in everything she did. Faith closed her eyes and let her. She was breathing harsh and uneven and Tara already knew every spot that wanted her so bad.

When Tara's mouth reached the edge of her jeans, Faith gasped and opened her eyes. "I thought we were going slow?" she said, as Tara undid the snap and pushed her jeans down.

"We are..." Tara nodded gravely. "We're just going further. But. Slowly."

"Oh God. I think slow is gonna kill me. Did I mention that?"

"Yes, I think I remember you saying that." Tara pulled her jeans down, leaving Faith naked and flushed beneath her. Then she took of her own pants, and lay down again. She kissed Faith, lingering, so fucking goddamn slow. Faith moaned, reached for her, wanted her.

"Let me," Tara breathed. "Baby, let me."

"Oh fuck--Tara--"

The thing I love most about dialogue in sex scenes is that a tiny exchange of lines, like this, can imply so much about the actions. That's why dialogue in sex scenes is hot: it gives the reader a chance to imagine something way kinkier than is present in the writing.

"Wait." She sat up and worked her way lower. She ran her fingers up the backs of Faith's calves. Faith felt her breath hiss between her teeth. Tara smiled, the playful, kittenish smile Faith had learned so well in the last weeks. "It'll be good. I promise."

Faith forced her hands still. Tara caressed her so lightly she barely felt it, and at the same time it felt like Tara was right inside her skin, feeling what she felt, drawing it out.

When Tara's hands ran up between her thighs, Faith groaned and arched up, seeking more contact. She was wet and Tara's fingers slipped through her folds so easily. She rocked forward, delight rushing between her legs.

"Harder...please...ohfuck..."

My Faith swears during sex. No other character I write does. Some people write Buffy swearing during sex and I don't believe it. Of course, like most of my pronouncements, there's an exception--but you'll have to read my next commentary for that. Grin.

"No." And Tara kept on with her barely-there touch. She was everywhere in the feel of it, soft and gentle and so tender it almost hurt; and if Faith tensed then she would pause, wait, patient and serene. "Relax," she whispered.

Lots of semi-colons in this part. I think it's partly for rhythm, but it's also partly because I was so rushed in writing this ending, and I'm very likely to write with semi-colons, then realize that they aren't needful.

Faith panted and begged and there was nothing but Tara. She was right on the edge of coming and Tara left her hanging there for so long, the tingling sense of almost rushing through her whole body until she couldn't think, couldn't move. The world was white and empty and there was nothing anywhere until Tara said, "Let go," and she did, loosening her whole body at once. Tara pulled ecstasy from her body, longer and longer and oh God it had never been like this.

I'm a sucker for run-on sentences during sex.

She came in waves, until the pleasure was so strong it was nearly pain; sweet and overflowing; and when Tara kissed her she felt it in every pore of her body.

Tara loved her with her touch, delicate and deep. Nothing so powerful as gentleness. Nothing so strong as peace.

I'd already written the summary for the story before I got here, so this basically reiterates it. Plus, the request was for "tender lovemaking", and I was trying to prove I'd done it.

And even as she rolled over to love Tara back, Faith knew that she never wanted it any other way.

Usually I try for reciprocity in my sex scenes, but one, this was a good scene-ender, and two, no time.

"Faith! You did it!" Tara flung her arms around Faith and kissed her cheek. "I knew you could!"

Faith grinned. "Yeah, I guess I did." She crumpled the Doublemeat Palace chicken-hat in her hand.

More canon. I loved that hat. I would wear it any day.

"I don't know if I want everyone to know, though."

"But you have a job. We should celebrate."

"You've been doing temp-work for three weeks. We didn't do anything for you."

Tara sniffed. "Well, but we should. I just thought of it first."

Anya paused in the common room and pointed at Faith. "You don't have enough self-esteem, you procrastinate, and if Tara hadn't pushed you you wouldn't have even applied for that job. But sometimes you make good choices."

Faith made a disgusted face. "The grease stink says I suck at decisions. Frying burgers isn't the joyride the orientation video makes it out to be."

This is from my own experience at Tim Horton's. I spent four hours watching orientation videos. Oh, God, those are hours I will never get back. The humanity!

"Well then," Anya said. "Shower twice and then sign up for my next high school equivalency class. Education is the first step towards a profitable career, possibly in retail."

Like the Magic Box!

Faith shook her head. "Money isn't everything."

I want someone to say this to Anya. She'd either lunge for them in a murderous rage or stalk off, muttering.

Anya stared at her blankly for a second, then stalked out of the room, muttering.

Tara giggled. "You liked money fine the last time I checked."

"Yeah, but I like messing with Anya's head better." Faith threw the chicken-hat on the couch, where she was, by Anya's edict, no longer sleeping. She'd reassigned Tara's room as a double, glaring the whole time.

I think this bit about Anya reassigning Tara's room as a double might go by too quickly, but it's not crucial, and I had only mere minutes left before I posted this, so whatever. I imagine that Faith does get her GED and she and Tara find some low-rent housing, and from there, work their way to happy middle classness! Like me!

"But celebrating I can get behind. We could go dancing?" she suggested, raising an eyebrow.

"As long as you're there." Tara kissed her. "I'm sure it'll be the best celebration ever."

Proof that they've really moved past what happened the last time they went dancing.

Faith grabbed Tara and pulled her into her arms. "I guess Anya was right after all."

"About your high school equivalency?"

"Blech. No." Faith kissed her again, slow, because slow was good, but with a promise of fast and hard when the time came. It didn't matter that people could see them, or that they might fuck this up somewhere down the road.

I always like to include a caveat at the end of my happy-ending stories, the idea that things could go south, because I'm not sure Faith has the relationship skills to keep something like this going. So there's always the possibility of flaming breakups, especially in my Buffy/Faith fics.

Tara smiled at her, so tender and so fucking strong, and yeah, this was the best decision she'd ever made. "About me," she said. "Sometimes, I do make good choices."

Ta-da!

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April 3, 2005