With the beat of a heart

Spoilers: Nada

Disclaimer: Joss owns em, I don't.

Distribution: the usuals. anyone else, just ask

Dedication: for my Dad, who promised me that one day I'd find a guy who'd live in my underwater paradise with me.

Notes: the song, "Love Came for Me", is the love song playing at the end of the movie "Splash", and go get it from Napster or something if you've never heard it, cause it's fricking beautiful. This whole thing came about from me listening to that song and Joshua Kadison's "Beautiful in My Eyes" on repeat. Written in like 45 minuets, and so totally not beta-ed.

My baby girl just got married. It was the most beautiful ceremony I've ever seen. The love in that room was practically tangible. Our entire family was there, from Giles and Joyce all the way down to Dawn's twins.

Yeah, hardly any of us share blood, but it's not blood that makes a family, love does. Sorry, didn't mean to go off track there. Where was I? Oh yeah, Juliana's wedding.

The ceremony was wonderful. By the time Giles was done talking, there wasn't a dry eye in the place, mine especially. Poor Xander was trembling the entire time he walked her down the aisle, and not even my holding on to his arm when he sat down helped.

Juliana and Michael just had their first dance, to the same song Xander and I danced to at our wedding almost 30 years ago, "Love Came for Me". The entire ballroom was silent, watching the two of them just sway in each other's arms.

If someone were to ask me why I spend every night fighting the good fight, all I have to do is think of the way my daughter looks right now, dancing in the arms of her husband, the son of my first boyfriend and my one-time sworn enemy. The two of them represent everything that is pure and good in this world. They are the essence of what we fight for, what we fight to preserve.

Xander's still a little shaky, even now as he walks over to our daughter to dance the father-daughter dance. As he pulls her towards him, I'm reminded of how Xander would stand on his knees when Julie was four so he could dance with her. Or when she was 13, and was invited to her very first formal, so her Daddy had to teach her the proper way to dance. Of course, all Xander knows how to do are the box step and the Snoopy Dance, but he gave it his all.

Those two people are everything to me. Juliana is my angel, my sweetheart, my babydoll, my Little Bit, my bundle of trouble with her father's smile. I got to be the mother to her that my own Mom never wanted to be to me. She's beautiful, inside and out, and my fondest wish is that she always remember that.

As for Xander, well, he's my everything. He's my peace of mind in this crazy world, my husband, my best friend, my rainbow skies. He's beautiful too, even with the lines that are slowly appearing around his eyes from a lifetime's worth of smiles and the gray hair that's creeping up around his temples. I've spent my entire life in love with him, and the past 29 years of my life married to my other half. I don't think anyone else could ever feel as blessed as I feel right now.

*****

"Daddy?"

"Yeah baby?"

"I miss Mom."

"I do too, Julie. I do too."

The End