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It had never occurred to Willow that she is falling short when it comes to nerdy clichés until she is being guided to a rooftop, images of constellations that she’d studied in books already running through her mind. She’s lead by Tara, their hands interlocked, to a pallet that someone had to have already spread out earlier. Tara drops her hand and sits on the pallet, leaving plenty of space for her girlfriend to join her.
Willow looks, for a moment, at the night’s sky. She marvels at the vast expanse of deepness, a deepness that she can’t justify labeling as dark, or empty. Especially not empty, she further corrects her initial thoughts, the sky holds everything in an embrace. Everything, including her. It’s truly beautiful. Almost incomparably so. Almost.
“Willow”, the very beauty her thoughts were drifting to calls to her. When Willow turns around to the source of the voice, a proud smile overcomes her face of contentment, and she lowers herself down to her knees on the pallet. Tara grins involuntarily, leaning so she’s facing more toward her pallet partner. “What are you thinking about that has you so smiley?”
“Oh-“, she places a hand on the pallet in front of her, “-you know.” Her other hand falls closer to where Tara’s outstretched one rests, she’s near enough that she can brush her thumb over her pinky. Her words are urged on by the energy that flows from only a fraction of their touch, and she’s leaning closer as she speaks, “It just hit me how proud I am to be your girlfriend.” A twinkle of emotion can be seen in Tara’s eyes, causing an indescribable color to shimmer across the blue of her irises, where the reflection of the moon, and the shine of her unshed tears blend so evenly it seems right. No, perfect.
Perfect is how she’d describe it; the picture that she fails to paint with words, the feelings reverberating through her, the buzz she gets from touching her, and the soft, familiar, and inviting sensation of Tara’s lips on her own. The buzzing energy that was flowing through Tara’s hand into her own is now surrounding her completely. She’s only loosely aware of her surroundings as the energy seeps into her veins and the accelerated beat of her heart warms her skin. She resituates herself so that she isn’t on her knees and when their lips meet again, Willow finds herself falling back, until she’s laying with Tara beside her, propped up on an elbow. Her hands roam where they can, grazing over hip, thigh, abdomen, and one coming to rest in silvery hair, massaging where neck meets skull. A small sound that is in between a moan and a growl does not go unheard by Willow, and she starts a mental list of places that Tara likes to be touched.
Tara is just as eagerly dragging her fingers over taught stomach muscles, and even exposed expanses of neck, but being careful to stay a chaste distance above pantline. The need for air causes her to break their kiss, and instead, Tara begins a line of kisses down Willow’s jaw, stopping to nip at her ear playfully, taking notice of the flushed girl’s reaction, adding make-Will-make-that-sound-again to her To-Do List. Then, she continues down until she reaches her clavicle, where she places a final, longer kiss, and then licks a single line with the tip of her tongue back up Willow’s jaw.
She leans back to look at Willow’s face. The shade that’s showing on her face clashes majorly with the red of her hair. Willow’s eyes are still closed, and she’s struggling to even her breathing out. What she’s feeling, the feeling of being complete, and of possessing their power, combined, is building to an intensity that she’s not ready for. Tara knows this, so she rolls onto her back and offers herself as a human pillow for her disheveled girlfriend.
With the taste of perfection on her tongue, Willow settles against Tara’s side, allowing the older witch to cover them both with a blanket.
+++
“You’re warm.” A small yawn escapes the younger girl, who lays with her head resting against the even rise and fall of her makeshift pillow’s chest.
“Do you need me to move the blanket?”, Tara doesn’t move her arms that she has wrapped around her sleepy girlfriend, but she waits for Willow to tell her what would make her more comfortable.
“No, please”, Willow nuzzles her nose against her source of warmth, “This is perfect.”
She can’t help but notice her repetitive use of the word tonight. Perfect; but what else could I call it? Everything is just so...perfect. Willow internally rolls her eyes at herself and lifts her head to rest her chin on Tara’s chest, so she can look at the woman who is already smiling at her when she does. “Hi.” Tara grins wider and replies, “Hi.”
Tara’s hand is drawing shapes across Willow’s back. Soft, but sure touches. She eventually finds her way to the base of Willow’s neck, where she fiddles with the hairs that have fallen that way.
“How’s it going?”
“It’s going pretty well for me.”
Willow’s eyes flutter closed and she’s enjoying the relaxation that she feels, slipping in and out of sleep’s grip. “That’s good.”
Tara pauses her movements and the reaction she was hoping for was garnered. “Hey”, Willow is looking at her with half lidded eyes, having been dozing off seconds previous, “Why’d you stop?”
“Why the smalltalk?” Tara quips, a smile stuck on her features. Willow’s nose scrunches adorably as she yawns, and the start of her reply is muffled. “One to two word replies means less talking; less talking, more snuggling.” Tara laughs softly at the kindergarten level that her usually-eloquent-with-words girlfriend is opting to speak at. She stretches up enough to kiss her on the tip of the nose, which she sees scrunches again as she pulls away.
“Well, okay.” Tara looks away faux-casually as she starts speaking and looks back mischievously as she continues, “I guess we can’t talk about how wonderful, talented, intelligent, intuitive, beautiful, and undeniably adorable my girlfriend is then.” Willow smiles at her lopsidedly before squinting in mock irritation.
“That’s cheating!” Willow rolls onto her front, trapping Tara beneath her. She catches Tara’s laughs of adoration with her lips, kissing her lengthily once, and then placing small pecks around her face. “How dare you make me choose between having my ego pet and my nap-cuddles! You knew I’d have to lend my ear to a smooth talker like you.”
“That’s right.”, Tara returns the dotted kisses across Willow’s cheeks before teasingly saying, “If we’re just going to go to sleep, we can return to the comfort of a bed.”
Willow rests her face on her hands, elbows on either side of her human cushion. “I’m pretty sure you’re more comfortable than just any old bed.”
“I’m glad you feel that way, but sadly I do not share the same sentiment for this rooftop.” Willow snickers and rolls off of Tara, offering her arm to the girl. Tara snuggles into her side and Willow guides her leg on top of her own partly, so that they’re at least a little tangled. Tara finds the redhead’s effort to make her more comfortable endearing and kisses her briefly on the throat, before turning to look at the stars.
After a moment or two of silence, Willow softly says only two words, “Canis Major.” Tara waits for Willow to elaborate, but she doesn’t seem to plan on doing so, so Tara shifts a little to be able to see her face when speaks next. “What?”
“The Canis Major is home to the brightest star. Several stars form the constellation, but the Alpha Canis Majoris is the center of attention. Without it, the Canis Major would be like every other constellation.” Willow speaks fondly of the constellation she’s describing, looking at the sky, but seeing something else in her mind’s eye.
Tara listens attentively but waits for Willow, sure that she’ll speak again when she has the words. “I think that us Scooby’s are like that. All of us are needed to make the gang, but only one of us is the main attraction.” Willow starts tracing random shapes across the skin beneath her fingers, pausing for only a second before continuing this time. “I think I’m speaking for mostly everyone when I say that most of us assume that that brightest star is Buffy.” Tara hums in agreement and thinks of all that the Slayer has done in just the time she’s known her. “The thing is, I don’t. I love Buffy, don’t get me wrong, and she’s done too much good to try to count, but she isn’t our Alpha Canis Majoris.”
Now Tara’s confused. How could the Slayer not be the brightest star among them?
“See, the Alpha Canis Majoris is what sets the Canis Major apart from other constellations. The Alpha Canis Majoris is different, in a very special way, and it can’t be mimicked by the other stars.”
Tara is watching the expression behind Willow’s words and she can tell that Willow feels a great deal of admiration for this Alpha Canis Majoris. Willow, herself, is trying to make her words fit to her feelings, finding the English language to be a challenge.
“Buffy is the Slayer. She’s the standard for the gang, with a lot of heroic exceptions, but still the basis upon which we’ve all built. Giles is an older, less field ready version of her, and Xander, and I have always been her database buddies who struggle to keep up, but manage. Anya falls into the research crew too, and can also check ‘had affiliations with Xander’ off her bucket list. We’re all here because circumstance placed us here, because it’s what was predicted for us.”
Willow is getting more frustrated as she tries to explain and Tara grabs her hand that she’s gesturing around with, lacing their fingers together. Willow finally turns to face her and smiles briefly, looking into her eyes as if she’s trying to establish a wavelength between them.
“Basically, what I’m trying to say is, You’re the Alpha Canis Majoris to our Canis Major.” Tara blinks slowly as she processes the extent of Willow’s words. Her eyebrows furrow in confusion and she says, after a moment, “I don’t understand. How could I… I-I’m not that special.”
Willow moves to hold Tara’s face between her hands, and brushes her thumbs across the girl’s cheeks. “But you are”, she nods a little in disagreement and Willow takes notice, “Baby, yes you are.” Willow holds eye contact with Tara, seeing the true disbelief in her comfortable eyes. Willow’s chest aches in remorse, realizing that she hadn’t been showing how much her love means to her.
“Do you remember when we first met? Really met, not the Wicca group.” Willow pauses to let Tara reply and she nods again, this time to say yes. Willow lets one hand slide off Tara’s face and softly traipse its way down the other girl’s arm, where she waits for the right moment to interlock their fingers.
“We were fighting some force of evil, as per usual, and we were chased into the same room. I tried to move the soda machine in front of the door, but had never moved anything more than a pencil before. You looked at me, and put your hand into mine.” Willow’s fingers squeeze into place when she says this, and she feels the same energy she had that day, but stronger, more familiar, and so much more addicting. “I could see, in your eyes, what I’d find out was true not long after getting to know you. I see unabashed independence, strength, intelligence, kindness, and power, all wrapped up in one soul. And I trusted it, and we moved the machine, together.”
Willow brings their intertwined hands between them and places small kisses on each knuckle. She feels like she’s outside of the grips of time and that experience is one she only has with Tara. Tara lays her index finger on the area of Willow’s face that is closest and she does her best to caress the soft skin with her limited resources.
“Tara, what I’m trying to say is, you have a willingness to bare your soul, and that’s special. You shared some part of yourself with me, even though we’d never really met, and when we became friends, you put your all into helping my other, weirder friends. Most of us would have tucked-tail and ran. The rest of us barely share our feelings with each other, let alone expose the deepest parts of ourselves.”
Tara laughs softly at Willow’s aggravated choice of words, but she can tell that her eyes are tearing up as Willow struggles to explain her thoughts.
“I love you, okay. And maybe my reasoning is biased, but I love you.” Willow finally gives up on her abused-and-overused metaphor and just gets frustratedly to the point. Tara’s resolve is completely crumbled by this and her laughter is being drowned by the tears that are escaping her eyes and rolling down her cheeks. Willow notices the tears and worry feels her gaze. “Oh god, Tara, are you okay? I didn’t mean to upset you, I-“
“No,no”, Tara cuts Willow off, trying to halt her anxious thoughts, “I’m- I love you too. I really, really love you.” Their lips meet and Willow tastes the salt of Tara’s tears. She rests her forehead against Tara’s, her breath coming out ragged and her own tears having started falling at some point. She can’t help but to think…
“You know, this is just so-“
“Perfect. Yeah, I know.”