Title: Epiphany
Author: Natauni
Rating: PG13
Notes: Okay after watching Epiphany for about the MILLIONTH time, this little thing sorta demanded writing. I need a new hobby. Meanwhile I have a Host/Cordelia 'coping' piece I really hope to iron out and post too sometime fairly soon.... Don't worry it's C/A. I just think they need a little help via our favorite vocalist. ;p
Disclaimers: All standard disclaimers still apply.
Distribution: If you want it take it, but you're really sick.
Looking back, I see that I'm the only one to blame. I was too stupid...too distracted to even sense that it was coming.
Then tonight I knelt down on the floor in front of her and she cast her eyes to the side. It hit me hard.
And every single bit of it is entirely my fault.
I should have seen the signs. I should have been more aware. There's really no excuse for the reason I didn't anticipate this moment. Nothing is going to make it more livable. I knew her longer than of any of us. I used to see her most clearly. And yet I was utterly blind.
Somehow I labeled her safe. She wasn't my "type." There was no room for sexual attraction -- she was my "best friend" and my seer. I could never take advantage of her that way. I told myself I could never love a woman the way I had loved Buffy.
It's amazing how well you can lie to yourself when you're desperate not to have your soul put in jeopardy again.
Love burns you. I said that to a foolish young man across a creaky kitchen table just weeks ago. I meant it too. Coldly and without the slightest bit of empathy I stared straight ahead and talked about how love is the kind of destructive source that takes your heart and pulls it out through your throat. Problem is I wasn't being honest with myself any more than I was with him. And I had no idea what I was truly talking about.
I was still so numb at the time. Numb enough to forget that love doesn't rip your heart out of your chest, it leaves it there in aching agony until you're ready to find a scalpel yourself.
"I'm not all right." Cordelia Chase looked me right in the face for the space of about ten full seconds and then she turned away and said the most singularly life-changing thing anyone has ever said to me. It wasn't accusing. It wasn't angry. It wasn't cold and it wasn't meant to hurt me -- it was just meant to be the truth. Because that's what she's always been for me.
She struggled to her feet with the help of a wincing Wesley, and she told me I'd broken her heart.
Totally broken her heart.
"You really hurt my feelings." For anyone else those words have to be synonymous with "I want to die now." With "it's all over. Now leave me alone." With "it is finished."
For her to say such a thing is the same as if anyone else had said they hated my guts...that I'd betrayed an utter confidence.... I felt like a murderer standing there as she made her way from the room without as much as looking back. And I should have. Our friendship is currently the vegetative patient growing cold on the ground.
"You hurt my feelings." She actually acknowledged that someone else had gotten in: that I had truly hurt her feelings. She admitted it. Cordelia is never not okay. She could be bleeding and she'd be fine as long as I was willing to pay the dry cleaning bills. She could be scared out of her wits and she'd be cracking some kind of acerbic commentary as she found a safe place under the desk to stay under cover. She feels, but she's always able to cope. She's never made weak.
Cordelia Chase is never broken. She doesn't cry. She'll cry when she goes home alone tonight, though. And I'll be the one standing outside knowing as much as I may want to that I have no place trying to go in and comfort her. Because this is my fault.
You know, I realize that life has its share of ironies, but did I have to crush her spirit before I realized how much I needed to love it?
Epiphany. Crap -- I don't need an epiphany, I need a stake. What in hell am I supposed to do now? How do I possibly fix something broken so carelessly, when as Wesley says I don't even "know" her any more? Even if I now see that I want to?
Cordelia Chase is the single strongest, most enduring person I have ever met in my life and I broke her. I squashed -- if not destroyed -- the reason I fell in love with her. Without even trying.
I love her. Yes, I said love her. I'm in love with her.
Great time to finally figure that out, don't you think? God, Angel, what have you done? And what in hell are you supposed to do now?