Alive
by Te
July 1999

Disclaimers: I own nothing here but my own 
terrors.

Spoilers: Consequences, Enemies, Graduation 
1&2

Summary: This mind, this body.

Ratings Note: R for language, implied smut, 
imagery some readers may find disturbing.

Author's Note: Some days I have a hard time
waking up, and I wonder.

Acknowledgments: To Iain, and Dawn Sharon 
for comments and help. 

Feedback: *PLEASE*. Always. 
thete1@earthlink.net

*
She's moving out in all directions...
*


Faith would.

Faith would climb so far... and when her muscles
didn't agree with her ambition she was surprised.
Too surprised to hurt.

Faith would dance all night if she could.

Faith would fuck herself numb on anything ready,
willing, and able.

*Xander beneath her, throat so tight and fragile 
under her palms*

She wants to feel sick but she's not.

Faith isn't anything anymore.

Much too deep for that. She knows that, even with
the blankness. The blackness. She's too far down 
to even wish she could open her eyes -- just once -- 
on sunlight. 

Not far enough to forget, though.

She doesn't think she'll ever get that far down. 

Once upon a time Faith propped a woman who 
wore something close to her own face up on a 
couch and watched a syringe fall right out of a 
scabbed-up arm.

It hadn't been empty, and she'd quick-pressed it 
against the fleshy part of her thigh and had just 
enough time to be shocked it didn't break the 
flesh immediately before it was in.

*Won't you touch me first?*

And then she'd pushed it down and the fear hit so
hard she was never really sure how long it took 
for the horse to kick. But it did, and Faith thinks 
it was completely different from this sleep save for
the dreams. 

She never knew she could dream so much she could
feel it, know it wasn't real. Though Faith can't really
compare... all she knows is that sometimes she 
punches and punches and punches and never gets 
tired, never feels the heart stop.

And sometimes her body is touched, turned and 
massaged by impersonal fingers. And voices tsk 
about bedsores and sensitive skin.

Faith is pretty sure she knows which one's the 
fantasy, but none of it feels very different.

*None of them want you like I do*

Buffy comes, sits in the chair beside her. She
always wears pale, pale blue. Her roots always 
show. One day Buffy told her about the Boss and
her voice was angry, defiant.

Later, she asked Faith if he'd really been good to
her. If that was the reason.

Faith likes to think she wouldn't have answered 
even if she could.

One day a tiny spider tickled it's way from 
shoulder to neck to shoulder again and again 
and again. Faith screamed until she felt the 
coolish rag wipe it and the web away. That was 
the first time she'd seen herself since the sleep.

There had been blood, and her lip was chewed. 

Later, she played dress up with herself until she 
was cased from head to heel in leather that only 
creased and bent where it was supposed to. 
Nothing obvious like red or black -- a rich deep 
brown leather that made her want to touch 
herself, dance.

She did both, and almost felt herself to be 
someone separate and free. An audience to the
whore in the spotlight. 

Someone who could get their kicks and walk 
out blinking into sunlight, into the life that 
waited there. 

But the whore finally ran out of moves and then
just sat there, watching and watching and 
watching until her eyes were Faith's own again 
and the spotlight shone on nothing at all.

Every four times she's turned she calls it a day. 
That means she's been here for a couple of weeks, 
but she knows that doesn't mean anything. Some 
places don't turn the patients that often, some 
days she becomes aware of her left cheek on the 
pillow when it should be the right, sometimes she 
loses count.

When she's close, she's just under the surface. 
Every touch, every word brings her closer and 
closer to the world until it feels like there's nothing
between her and sunlight -- she can feel it on her 
face sometimes -- but her own skin.

It always fades.

Sometimes Buffy cries quietly and just keeps saying
she's sorry. If she could, Faith would tell her that
being alive is always better. She would tell her that 
sometimes the touches aren't very impersonal, and 
that sometimes she can see that it's Buffy's head
bent over her.

Feels small, rough hands slide under the thin, 
papery fabric of her gown and stay there, warm 
and restless. 

Sometimes she's running and her legs flex and 
move perfectly and her hair whips out behind her 
and her laughter is only as uneven as her panting 
breath. 

Sometimes Faith lets herself die at Buffy's feet, and
that's when it's just like the needle. Like sitting 
there and feeling and feeling until there's nothing 
and no one but the magic in her veins.

Last time she felt herself plunge so far down, 
further than she'd ever been, and black velvet walls
flayed themselves into ropes that twisted in and 
held her.

So still.

She wonders when she'll go back.

end.

Lyrics from "And She Was" by Talking Heads