It wasn't fair, and it wasn't right, but I suppose I have no rights to complain, since I left you long before you actually decided to go. But, in the end, I guess I was a lot like you. Well, a lot like you were always accused of being, always wanting the thing you can't have.

Of course, the way things always worked out for us, there was never a time when I was allowed to have you.

Sure, I suppose people thought we might get together after the incident in the factory, but you and I both knew that if we did that, we wouldn't be happy. We wouldn't have been fair. We would have blamed each other for every little thing that didn't go our way.

And nothing would have gone our way, would it?

The Hellmouth would have seen to that if our typical luck hadn't. We were such good friends, and such amazing lovers, Xander. Why couldn't we ever get it right?

Not that we ever made love. That would have been the step neither of us could have walked away from. But we each went on to do it and walk away from it, didn't we?

Oh. You didn't know?

Yeah, Oz and I…the night before graduation. And a few more times after that. But then things happened. It all sort of fell apart after you left. Funny that you couldn't manage to come between us while you were here, but you did when you left.

I have way too much irony in my life.

Not that you were the only reason that we split up. We were going in different directions. I mean, Oz went to college because that's where I was going to be, but I needed to go there to be me. And he wanted me to be too much a part of him and me.

Am I making any sense?

I guess it doesn't matter, since you're never going to see this. After all, you left on your trip two years ago. I'm beginning to believe that either you're dead or you've landed on a deserted island with an assortment of crazy characters.

But stuff like that only happens on TV, doesn't it? Of course, stuff like vampires and witches and werewolves only happens on TV too.

So maybe you are lost on some uncharted desert isle. Buffy would be Skipper. You'd be Gilligan. Giles would be the Professor. Cordelia would be Ginger. Spike and Drusilla would be Lovey and Thurston Howell the Third. I'd be Mary Ann.

I always thought Mary Ann was kind of a sad character. Which is only fitting since these days I spend a lot of my time being sad. Giles won't even let me cast, saying that I'm liable to get myself hurt with my lack of focus.

That's right, I've become very Xandery in your absence. My grades are shot. They're going to rescind my scholarship if I don't do something soon, but I can't help it. I'm so caught up in thinking about you that I forget what I'm supposed to be doing.

It's like…remember the time when we were in 6th grade and we were supposed to be making some stable compound in earth science and I asked you to pour in some Sodium Chloride and instead you poured in…well, I don't remember really what it was. A lot of the memory was lost in the explosion you caused. That's how I feel all the time now, like a part of me has been forgotten in the resulting explosion.

Everyone thinks that you're dead. I wonder how that feels, to have everyone think that about you. Right now they just think that I should go see someone. Like seeing some sort of shrink would make it all better. Like seeing someone I can't tell even a little bit of the truth to would make me want to go on living without you.

I told them, when they dared to bring it up, that the only person I could see that would make me feel better was you, and they got that look that they try to hide from me. The look that says "Poor Willow, we had such high hopes for her."

Giles gets that look a lot.

It's hard. Knowing that I'm disappointing him and Buffy. It's hard knowing that I'm letting everyone down. But the only person whose approval I ever needed or wanted isn't around to see the mess that I've become, so I guess that means that I'm not doing too bad, right? I mean, I haven't disappointed you, have I?

I almost laughed the time you told me that you needed me to approve of you. It was so funny, considering I'd spent my entire life trying to be the girl I thought you might want.

But I was never that, was I Xander? I was always the best buddy or the illicit smoochies. But I was never her. I was never the Cordy or the Buffy or the Faith. I was just way too normal, way too easy, way too…Willow. You wanted danger. You wanted all the things that your parents made you think relationships were made of.

All I ever wanted was for you to love me.

But, it's been two years and things are the same on the Hellmouth. Buffy's still alive. Giles is still around. And good, old, faithful Willow is still at the computer, wondering what you're doing.

What are you doing?

Are you alive? Are you out there somewhere? Is someone loving you?

You can't be dead. I'd know. Somehow, I'd know. My heart would die with you. And it's still beating, so I know you're out there. And I know that someday you'll come back to me.

And the way our lives have gone so far, you'll take one look at me and run away. You were always so much better at that than anything else.