One bad thing about having only one club in Sunnydale, nothing much ever changes. Although, walking in and seeing the group clustered around the pool table, it seems as though something is up. Always craving the action, I peek over the shoulders of two of the guys from my history class. "What's going on? Is there a funny thing?"

My humor dies in my throat, which is kind of funny since I'm watching some basketball jerk choking some poor girl. *That* hits a little too close to home. I burst through the crowd and rip him away from her. Tossing him aside with strength I didn't know I possessed, I snap. "Back off. You stay the hell away from her."

He looks up at me like I'm crazy. "Okay." Then he's gone.

I turn back to the damsel in distress. Maybe she'll be new in town and doesn't know that I'm…well, me.

"Xander."

So much for that…I look her over and think I'm going to die of shock. Willow - sweet, innocent Willow - is standing in front of me wearing some really tight and rather revealing leather. "Will. Changing the look not an idle threat with you." I've never been at a loss for words and this is no exception. I think about the conversation we had earlier today and I wonder if that is what brought this on or if maybe I had a little something to do with it.

"You're alive."

She slinks toward me and slides her hands along my neck. At first I think she's going to kiss me and my heart starts a tango in my chest. But instead, she rests her head against my neck and rubs her hands over my back.

"Will, this is verging on naughty touching here." And I am a *very* happy man. "Don't want to fall back on bad habits" Especially since your boyfriend's going to be here any time. Suddenly, her hands aren't on my back, they've drifted lower and she's squeezing my butt. I can't help but jump. Willow…aggressive. Oh God, my dreams are seriously coming true here. "Hands! Hands! In new places." Nobody said I knew how to handle my dreams.

She backs away, a strange look on her face. "You're alive." Her voice is questioning.

I do the only thing I can do. Nod and wig. "You mentioned that before. Willow, are you okay?"

Her pale face molds into a pout and her voice is childlike. "No. Everything's different."

*There's* an understatement. Seems kind of odd coming from Willow dressed in leather, but I'll play along. I stare at her, trying to figure out the problem. I remember when she used to come to me with her problems. She looks away from me and I hear Buffy approaching.

Good. Buffy. She'll know what to do.

"There you are."

I just keep staring at Willow. "Hey Buff."

She stands beside me. Her tone is teasing as she realizes I'm standing in front of a girl. "Aren't you going to introduce me to your…holy God, you're Willow."

"You." Who knew Willow had venom?

"You know what?" Buffy turns to me for support. "I…I like the look." She turns back, realizing I'm at just as much of a loss. "It's um, it's…it's extreme, but it…it…it looks good. You know. It's a leather thing. And um, I," she looks at me again hoping I'll step in, but I have nothing to say. "Said extreme already, right?"

Willow walks closer and I'm scared by the fact that I'm not recognizing my best friend at all. She gets up in Buffy's face. "I don't like you."

"Will, I'm sorry about today." Buffy's scared, I think. Willow's friendship keeps her grounded. "You know how my foot likes to live in my mouth. But you know, you…you really didn't have to prove anything."

Willow sighs and rolls her eyes. "Leaving now." She turns and stalks away.

"Will, gotta say, not lovin' the new you."

Buffy follows her and grabs her arm, "Willow wait."

The sentence is barely out of her mouth before the demon that was my best friend in the whole world turns around, game face on. "Get off me."

We watch her walk away in silence as our world falls apart.

Xander hasn't said a word since we left the Bronze and I can't really blame him. Mostly because I'm too busy blaming myself. Willow's gone. My best friend in the world is gone forever. And I have to kill her now. Because that's my job.

Being me sucks.

I squeeze Xander's hand to offer him my support, although I feel weaker than when the Watcher's Council had Giles take my strength. "Xander?"

He sounds like a scared little boy. "Yeah?"

"I don't know how to do this." I hang my head, my feet automatically making their way to the library. "She's my best friend."

I look over at him and immediately feel bad for bringing up my problems. In some ways I'm too much like Faith, my problems come first.

"Xander…I'm sorry."

He's crying, sobs shaking his body. I guide him over to the wall of one of the warehouses and support him while he cries. He's lost so many people he's known and now he's lost his two childhood friends. "She's like a part of me, Buffy."

"I know Xander." I hug him and try to think of the strong, right things to say. But that's Giles' job. "Come on. We'll go to the library. Giles…" I hadn't thought about having to tell Giles. Willow's his favorite. "Oh, God. We have to tell Giles."

The library is quiet for the first time in a long time. Wesley is off doing something, thankfully out of my earshot, and so my haven is once again my own.

I have no idea what to do with myself. I can research, but it hardly seems worth the effort. Wesley will simply redo it and snap at Buffy if she listens to me instead of him. And judging from the fact that I've read this blasted paragraph fifteen times, I've forgotten how to read simply for enjoyment.

The sound of the library doors pulls me out of my seat. I know immediately it is Buffy. It's almost as if I can sense her. "Oh, Buffy. Thought you were going out tonight. I didn't expect you…" She and Xander are staring at me looking like they've lost their best friend. "What is it?"

"Giles…I…" Buffy can't seem to find the words she's looking for, so I turn to Xander. He's never been at a loss for words.

"Xander?"

He shakes his head and I can see his adam's apple bobbing as he struggles for speech.

"Tell me." A dark, cold fear has settled in my stomach and is inching its icy fingers up to my heart. "Please, tell me."

"Willow's dead." Buffy's whisper fills the room. "She's a…a…vampire." Tears choke her voice. "We saw her…" She shakes her head violently. "This can't be happening. Giles, please tell me this isn't happening?"

I gather both her and Xander into my arms and lead them over to the steps. We all sink down together, mired in our grief. It doesn't seem real. It doesn't seem right. She can't be gone. She's the one that held us together.

I fiddle with the cross I'd been carrying as we walked, wishing I'd never heard of vampires. Wanting to know who had done this to my Willow. Giles is holding his glasses in his hands, twirling them idly. Buffy is hunched in a ball, her leg drawn up against her chest.

Willow is gone. I can't accept it. It's not real. It can't be real. Willow has been beside me my whole life, even when I've been the world's biggest ass. Like I said, my whole life. I don't know how to go on without knowing she's there. And it doesn't seem to work knowing she's there and sucking somebody's blood.

I take a deep breath to steady myself, pushing the thought out of my mind. "This isn't real."

"I can't feel anything. Arms. Legs. Anything." Buffy's voice is tinged with unshed tears. None of us seems able to do anything but stare ahead.

Giles twirls his glasses and manages to sum it all up. "She was truly the finest of all of us."

It doesn't seem like enough. Not a fitting enough eulogy for her. "Way better than me."

"Much, much better."

I see his nod out of the corner of my eye and can't even take offense. How can I possibly justify being offended? I'm the one who caused this. I didn't notice her for years, I lured her away from a perfect, stable relationship into a tawdry affair, I slept with another girl the night she told me she loved me, I hurt her more times than any human being should ever have to stand. "It's all my fault."

"No. It's me." The last time Buffy's voice sounded so sad was when she was trying to explain about Angel to the angry mob of us. "I…it's me. I'm the one who called her reliable. She must have gone out and gotten attacked, which she never would have done if I hadn't called her reliable. And now my best friend is…"

"What's going on?"

We all start. I can't help but pull back, clutching the cross to my chest, when I see her.

"Jeez, who died?"

I can only imagine the looks of shocked horror on our faces at that question.

"Oh, God. Who died?"

Giles starts to stand and say something, but I'm past him already, cross out. I lost my best friend in the world tonight and I'm not going to lose any more. Besides, without Willow, what's worth living for? I wave the cross in her face. "Back! Get back demon!" That's it, Harris, keep reminding yourself that it's not Willow in there.

She's staring at my like I've gone insane. Maybe I have. I shake the cross, making sure its doing it's thing then hold it up to her again.

There's a distinct lack of shrinking back in fear of the holy symbol. I'm confused.

Buffy walks forward to join us. "Willow, you're alive."

I can't believe it. I get no sense of vampiness off of her. She's breathing or doing a fair imitation of it. She's alive.

"Aren't I usually?"

"Oh!" I rush forward and hug her as tight as I possibly can. She's alive! I can't get close enough, can't show her enough how much she means to me. I feel Xander join us, his strong arms holding us all that much closer. His relief is probably stronger than mine, and I feel like mine is bigger than the universe.

"I love you guys too." Willow is confused. I can hear it in her voice, but I don't care. I don't ever want to let them go. "Okay, oxygen becoming an issue."

We pull back, giving her a little breathing room.

Her eyes are cloudy with concern. She probably thinks we've gone insane. I'm beginning to think we are too. "Giles, what's goin' on with these…"

I cut her off as I pull her to me. I want to make sure she's real and not just some dream my mind has made up to help me cope with the loss. I wrap my arms around her and close my eyes, a thousand prayers of thanks on my mind.

Suddenly I realize I'm holding one of my…charges, for lack of a better word, holding her tightly. I'm holding a decidedly underage one of my… I back up, my head hung down. "Oh, um, sorry…" I slip my hands in my pockets, just in case. Xander's hand rubs my back in sympathy. Poor kid probably suffering through the same thing as I am.

Buffy steps close to me and I can't help but feel like I've missed something. This must be what Oz meant that night about coming in during the middle of the play and not knowing your lines. "It's really nice that you guys missed me." I can't think of any explanation for their extreme weirdness. Well, maybe one. I did leave some of my magic supplies here. "Say, you all didn't happen to do a bunch of drugs, did ya?"

I meet Xander's gaze as he starts to speak. "Will, we saw you at the Bronze." Okay. I haven't been to the Bronze tonight. "A vampire."

And I've sure as heck never been one of those! "I'm not a vampire!" How dare he!

"You are." I look at Buffy, my confusion plain. "I…I mean, you…you…you were." She's obviously just as confused as I am and looking to the font of knowledge for an explanation. "Giles, planning on jumping in with an explanation any time soon?"

"Well, uh, something…something, um, very strange is happening."

If it were any other situation, we'd be laughing at him. Giles was never at a loss for some long-winded explanation. But my friends have been sitting here thinking that I'm dead. Xander breaks the uncomfortable silence finally. "Can you believe the Watcher's Council let this guy go?"

I can't help it. I start to giggle. Pretty soon, it's a full laugh and I can see Xander and Buffy struggling not to join me. It's not until Giles' smooth chuckle rings out that we all lose it and sink to the floor, our laughter mixing with our tears.

We stay on the floor for a time, the tension seeping out of the room. There are still issues between them, between all of us, but for now, they are three friends struggling to find an answer to a strange problem. I sit on the cart near my office - near her, looking at the three of them. Xander and Buffy are now sitting on the table, both staring at Willow as if afraid she's going to disappear.

I have to admit that my eye wanders over to her as well. Tonight we've had a taste, albeit a small one, of what life without Willow would be like. I don't think any of us would want to experience it again. The thought of what we will do when she goes away to college lingers in the back of my mind, but I don't want to mention it tonight. The cold dread I've already experienced was more than enough.

"What do we do?" Buffy looked at me then at Willow. "We have to figure out where we got a vampy Willow."

"She's right. We don't need two Willows. We have one. One's perfect." Xander nodded, although his eyes seemed to glimmer with a thought he probably shouldn't be thinking.

Willow crosses her arms in front of her. "This is creepy. I don't like the thought that there's a vampire out there that looks like me."

"Not looks like. Is."

Buffy nods. "It was exactly you, Will, every detail." She pauses for a moment and I wonder what exactly she's going to say next. "Except you're not being a dominatrix. As…as far as we know."

Well. That's…interesting.

"Oh right," she scoffs. "Me and Oz play Mistress of Pain every night."

I raise my eyebrows, silently admonishing myself for being intrigued.

Xander's eyes widen. "Did anyone else just go to a scary visual place?"

I hope my lack of answer is covered by Buffy's, "Oh yeah."

Fortunately, Angel strides in and starts babbling about Willow. Our little vampire is out playing. So we go out slaying.

With Willow at our sides.