Note: Thanks to my beta t_geyer for her unending patience, perseverance and support.

SECTION 3 - MY LAST BREATH

Hold on to me love
You know I can't stay long
All I wanted to say was
I love you and I'm not afraid


(Evanescence - Album - Fallen)




Chapter 3.06
Monday, May 27th, 2002


She gave him a small smile as she set a mug of coffee down in front of him. To her surprise he set aside his tumbler and picked up the non-alcoholic drink.

"Thanks, honey," he responded, his words quiet now, his mood no longer one of anger but more of a subdued acceptance. Anya was guessing that though he was by no means stone cold sober he was a long way from being drunk. "Honey?"

"Yes?" Anya waited to see where his helter-skelter mood ride was going to take him next.

"Thanks..."

Anya wasn't sure what exactly he was expressing gratitude for, but her smile widened anyway at his acknowledgement. "It's okay."

"No, it's not. I've been an ass and that's not okay."

"It's not like you can just be someone you're not."

"Ahn, trying to apologise here and I'm not very good at it, so maybe you could just listen?"

Anya clamped her mouth shut and sat down in the seat next to his.

"Anya, I love you. I never want to live a day of the rest of my life without you and if it ever seems like I'm forgetting that fact or if I'm taking you for granted, then tell me ... or make me sleep on the sofa or whatever it takes to make me wake up and do the right thing because I never want to lose you.

One of my friends died today and you know what I keep thinking? ...I can't remember the last time I had a real conversation with her. I mean, we kinda talked about the movies we watched the other week but I just have no clue what was really going on in her life... Like I knew about the curse and about splitting up with Tara, but I don't really know how she felt about it all. I didn't make time to go and talk to her and be there for her. I could have, but I thought I'd been through the whole mopey Willow thing twice before and I had better things to do with my time and I don't want to make that sort of mistake with you. Okay?"

Anya wasn't sure whether she was allowed to speak yet so she simply nodded.

"For starters, I want you to get in touch with your friend Evie and I want you to ask her over for dinner next weekend."

"Are you sure, sweetie? I mean I thought with Willow..."

"The curse didn't kill Willow..." Xander pushed his way out of his chair, his hands running nervously through his hair as he paused his pacing at the end of every sentence. "I don't know... I'm trying to do the right thing here and not get in the way of your friends coming round."

"Evie's my friend, but I don't think it would be fair to ask you to deal with her right now and I think she would understand that."

"Okay, how about later we check with the hospital again and we get some flowers or some balloons or something and we go see Buffy and Dawn?"

"But Buffy said-."

"That I shouldn't go back until I was ready to apologise to The-." A cool look from Anya changed his mind and he swiftly corrected himself before he squandered any brownie points he might so far have accumulated. "Spike... and Dawn. Yeah, well, maybe I realised that losing one friend is enough. You like the guy, right? Buffy likes him. Even Dawn likes him so he can't be all bad... Unless he's a really good actor or you're all really gullible... which is possible, but I promise to quit saying I told you so until I've got conclusive proof."

"You know you've never invited him over here before?"

"I know, but he wasn't living with Buffy before and you never used to seem to like him any better than I do."

Anya stood up and blocked the path of his pacing, her arms running gently down his arms when he halted uncertainly. "How about we get our coats and walk over there now? If things go okay we could ask them over for dinner... like a double date," she suggested.

"Later ." Xander's gaze fixed on his wife's delicate face. "I have something I want to ask you first." He reached up to gently cup her face, the ball of his thumbs stroking outward along her cheekbone. "Would you mind if we called our first little girl Willow?"

"B-but you said much, much older and much richer..."

"Yeah, but I'm an idiot. What I mean is, if you're ready, if you want to, then I'm okay with that... more than okay. I mean I want to have children with you and yeah, hopefully in time I'll get a promotion and more money and we'll be older but there's nothing stopping us from doing it sooner rather than later, if that's what you want. We could get by, maybe we wouldn't be able to afford a house in this part of town but I already make more than my dad does. You could be the sexiest mom ever." Xander's sentences all seemed to run together and he forced himself to take a deep breath. "I guess maybe I sorta set my whole personal life in a holding pattern as if we have forever but I kinda look at mom and dad and it makes me think maybe we should just wait a few years and make sure we're not going to turn out like them before we have kids and what I should be saying is 'we aren't like them'. We aren't like them because we love each other and that's why whether we have a stack of cash or we barely have two red cents to rub together we're going to make it."

Anya's eyes misted over but she smiled through her tears. "You want to make a baby with me? Now?"

"Right this minute. Okay... not a good choice of words.

I want to make love to my wife. I want to know how it feels to know that when I do there's a possibility that we could be creating something beautiful... or if you're unlucky something that looks like me instead of his mother."

"And you're not just saying this because of what happened with Willow and then you're going to change your mind?"

"I am saying this because of what happened with Willow but I do mean it. I've got to stop living with one foot out the door. You are the best thing that ever happened to me and if... Look, I'm not saying that I don't find the idea of being responsible for a tiny human scary. I do... but the idea of a little girl with your smile calling me daddy, the idea that maybe I'll keep putting off and saying later and then maybe I'll never get to meet her... that's scarier."

"Could Willow be her middle name? I always liked Amy... or Madeline... or-."

"Amy Willow Harris..." Xander ducked his head and pulled Anya in towards him until their lips touched. His tongue flicked out to brush her lips, tempting her to open herself to him and then withdrawing when she did, so that his lingering open-mouthed kisses left her longing for a deeper contact. "That sounds like someone I'd like to meet," he told her.

Anya's hands reached up, tugging on the tie that Xander had loosened long ago until the narrow end came free and the knot unravelled itself. Clasping both ends, she wound the material around her palms until Xander had nowhere to go. Their lips met once more, this time their tongues stroking each other, their contact enough to muffle Anya's surprised yelp when Xander picked her up and carried her through to the bedroom.

He laid her down on the bed and crawled his way over her until he was looking down directly into her eyes.

"I know this is kinda sudden and if you want we can keep using the condoms until you've been back on the pill long enough for it to be effective. It's your choice, Ahn."

Anya's gaze never wavered for a second. "Let's make a baby."

---

"He's not stupid, you know," Wes argued. "Many things, a lot of them unpleasant, but stupid isn't one of them."

Giles rubbed at his forehead and pulled off his glasses, letting them rest on the coffee table in front of him. "Perhaps it would be better if we reconvened in the morning, in any case. Inspiration may strike overnight... and if that fails we'll just have to claim ignorance."

Wes responded with a weary nod. "Are you heading for the hospital?" he asked the older man.

"Well, I should really give Spike his car back, I suppose." His answer was patently just a flimsy excuse.

"Come on, then." Wes picked up his suit jacket from the back of the sofa and put it on. "We've got about half an hour before the end of visiting hours. I'll give you a lift back to Spike's afterwards, assuming that's where you're staying."

"Until further notice... Though Quentin did offer me a room in one of the houses for the school inmates."

Wes smiled at the choice of word which made the girls sound more like prisoners than pupils. "And what did you tell him?"

"I pointed out that Buffy had been troublesome enough on her own at fifteen and I had no incentive to share living quarters with anywhere between three and eight girls that age."

---

"I have a strong suspicion that you have no intention of leaving?" Giles arched an eyebrow in the direction of the vampire as he passed over the keys for the DeSoto.

"Not until my girls can leave with me," the blond confirmed.

"That sounds like a plan to me," Dawn offered.

"The doctors wanted to keep you in overnight for observation," her sister retorted.

"I'm fine, now. They just want to keep me in because they can't understand why all their machines had a simultaneous meltdown. It's Billy Idol over there who's creaking like he's ready to drop to bits, and if we stay here he'll end up sleeping in a chair and Tara'll be on her own."

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Okay, okay. Giles, Wes, can you see if you can find a nurse or a doctor or something and let them know we want to discharge ourselves? And see if any of them know where our street clothes went."

"Yeah," Dawn added with a grin. "Spike's coat won't cover both our butts at the same time."

---

Marie eyed Wes's sombre suit with a critical eye. "Bad day?" she asked, already knowing much of the answer.

Wes gave a tired smile as Rosa ran straight from her bedroom into his arms, already in her pyjamas but her hair still wet from her bath. "It just got better."