(no subject)
Type; ficmix (fanmix + pieces of fanfiction)
Fandom; Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Title; Faded Hearts
Characters; Xander, Cordelia, some Jesse and Willow
Pairing; Xander/Cordelia, mentions of brief Xander/Willow
Rating; PG
Disclaimer; So not mine it's almost funny. I'm just playing around.
Summary; "Cordelia Chase, Xander had decided sometime in junior high, was quite possibly the worst girl in the universe."
Notes; Written in mostly two sittings. The songs may not fit with the fiction pieces, but just ignore that, k? Lots of love for
bringthewonder for hand-holding and song searching with me.
A, B, C // Jackson Five
you went to school to learn, girl/things you never, never knew before/like i before e except after c/and why 2 plus 2 makes four/now now now, i’m gonna teach you/teach you, teach you/all about love, dear/all about love
“Do you want to play house with me?” Xander recognizes the girl, think’s she’s in Miss Marker’s first grade class. He wouldn’t forget hair like that, hanging around her elbows in one long sheet of brown just the right color of chocolate. The stark white ribbon holding it back off her face is crooked and Xander almost opens his mouth to tell her before something pinches his arm.
“Ow!” He turns his attention back to Willow who is blinking at him with big, hurt eyes. He thinks, unfairly, that Willow’s hair doesn’t look nearly as soft as the other girls. But she’s his best friend, best girl friend but they aren’t dating anymore because he stole her Barbie last week. The new girl gives an impatient huff and Xander turns back to her. “Um, sorry. We’re playing doctor.”
She ignores his words and holds out her hand. “Come on. I’m Cordelia. We can play under the slide.” She smiles, big and white like the toothpaste commercials on TV and Xander doesn’t really know what to do.
“He said no!” Willow shouts, then immediately covers her mouth, eyes growing even wider. Cordelia finally turns her gaze on Willow and Xander thinks she doesn’t look so nice anymore.
“He your boyfriend?”
“N-no he’s n-not but we’re-” Willow hasn’t stammered like that in a long time and Xander reaches over to hold her hand. She blushes but Xander think’s there might be a smile edging it’s way up around the nervous twist of her lips.
Cordelia sniffs and by the time Xander turns toward the noise she’s running back to the slides, crying. He isn’t sure what he did but he thinks it might be important, somehow.
Seventy Times Seven // Brand New
as if it happening wasn't enough/i got to go and write a song/just to remind myself how bad it sucked/ignore the sun, covers over my head/wrote a message on my pillow that says/"Jesse, stay asleep in bed"/don't apologize/search your cell for something which to hang yourself/they say you need to pray/if you want to go to heaven/but they don't tell you what to say/when your whole life has gone to Hell!
Cordelia Chase, Xander had decided sometime in junior high, was quite possibly the worst girl in the universe. Leggy and brunette and entirely too attractive for Xander’s own good, not to mention the ease with which she tore him into little, bloody Xander-shaped scraps.
“Harsh, man,” Jesse said, mouth full of something no longer recognizable. “You need to learn to talk to the ladies.”
Xander curled protectively around the place in his stomach where he was sure his ego once lived. There was possibly a huge hole there, though it didn’t seem to be bleeding. Cordelia would never be so merciful as to actually kill one of her victims.
“Dude,” Jesse hissed, staring somewhere over Xander’s shoulder. Turning, Xander was met with the sight of his tormentor, staring at him like she was actually sorry. It lasted only a few heartbeats before her features reassembled themselves into a steely glare. Xander bit back the urge to hide.
“She was totally checking me out, right?” Xander stared at Jesse, one eyebrow raised but Jesse didn’t have the sense to deflate. “Yeah, she totally was.”
Xander almost wished she had been. It would be less confusing than a Cordelia Chase with remorse.
Strange Love // Goo Goo Dolls
you're likin' what I say/guess I was afraid you'd run away now/i'm loyal like a stray/never gonna turn and run away now/a passion junkie's fix is never satisfied/you're never gonna break his heart so have some fun abuse it
Cordelia doesn’t know how this happened. Xander’s mouth tastes like chocolate and he’s softer than her usual kind of guy but she isn’t pulling away. She’s tugging him closer, nails scraping over his scalp and shoulder. There’s competition in the way their mouths move, harsh and sharp like the words they throw at each other in the public. Desperate, like the ache of hunger in her heart.
“Wait, wait,” she gasps, and he’s across the closet in a second, chest rising and falling. She blinks, remembers how much more difficult it has been to slow things down with other boys and she’s laughing, hand over her mouth and breath catching. Xander Harris, everyone’s white knight.
Xander sneers, suddenly, and moves to leave. Cordelia reaches out, snags his shirt. “No, where are you-”
“Look,” he snaps, eyes dragging along her face with a spark that makes her hands tremble. “I’m not going to be part of some project for you, okay? No more closets and-” He waves his hand vaguely towards her and she shakes her head, opens her mouth to deny, finds it bone dry. “Whatever this is. I’m not some dirty little secret.”
She flinches, humor gone, if it was ever really there. “Xander, I’m not,” she pauses, holds her hands towards him, palms out like she’s calming a wild animal. “You have to understand.”
His laugh is humorless, his smile is self-deprecating. “That’s the point. I do understand.”
After he leaves Cordelia stays, trying to figure out when she became the heartless bitch from all the movies.
If she had to estimate, it was first grade, under the slides when Harmony Kendall helped her make fun of Willow Rosenburg.
Your Heart Is An Empty Room // Death Cab for Cutie
home's face: how it ages when you're away/spring blooms and you find the love that's true/but you don't know what now to do/‘cause the chase is all you know/and she stopped running months ago
“You have to ask me on a date,” Cordelia says, hands on her hips and towering over Xander like the queen she is.
“Um,” Xander says, clearly, and she rolls her eyes.
“If we’re doing this,” she waves her hand, an echo of a gesture he remembers making, “then we’re doing it right. I have a reputation to maintain.”
“Uh,” he adds, and she sighs. It doesn’t happen in slow motion, no, doesn’t speed up, Cordelia is leaning down at a perfectly normal pace and Xander manages to gather enough sense to kiss her back, hands loose in his lap as she pulls away, her eyes a confusing mixture of amusement and sadness.
“I’m giving a hell of a lot up for you, Xander Harris. Make it worth my time.”
It’s Beginning to Get to Me // Snow Patrol
are you beginning to get my point/that all this fighting with aching joints/it's doing nothing but tire us out/no one knows what this fight's about
Xander has never seen Cordelia cry. He know why, now. Her face is blotchy, mascara smeared around red rimmed eyes and two points of high color on her cheeks. She wipes at her eyes, spreading the line of black along her cheek. He wants to reach out and wipe it away. He doesn’t, bites his tongue, steadies himself with that pain.
“Cordelia,” he starts, flinches at her glare. He wants to fix this, wants to crack a joke that can make up for a misplaced kiss and a month of lies. “I’m sorry,” he says instead, bouquet of daisies limp between his sweating palms.
“Get out, Xander,” she says, voice wet and broken. Her hand shakes where it rests over the bandage on her abdomen. It isn’t the only sign of his mistake, but it’s the one that Cordelia will carry for the rest of her life.
He wonders, masochistically, if she’ll appreciate it as a reminder of his failure or hate it for the memory of her love.
11:11 P.M. // All American Rejects
space for thinking/space to scream to/but the echoes sound like you/not the stars at night/in a pitch black sky/i don't know just want to see you/but the time is right and it only flies
When Xander answers the door Cordelia is standing on his porch. She’s smiling, soft and careful, and he smiles back, unsurprised. “You heading out now?” he asks, takes in the rented car on his street and the sandals on her feet.
Cordelia never did like to drive in heels.
“Yeah,” she says, looking away. “L.A. fits me better than Sunnydale.” There it is, the haughty toss of her head and the steel in her spine. Not his Cordelia anymore.
She’s magnificent, and Xander wishes he could fix this, make her stay, make her want to stay. She doesn’t belong here like he does, though. She’s too big, too much for the life of a wannabe superhero.
“I’ll miss you,” he says instead of the pleading words running through his mind. “Take care of yourself.”
She laughs, bright and clear. Suddenly she’s right there, arms flung around Xander’s neck and mouth against his, a brief press of contact. Then she’s gone, walking the stride of a supermodel, an actress, a woman. “Don’t call me,” she calls back, but the words don’t sting with the taste of forgiveness she left on his lips.
He still sort of loves Cordelia even as she drives away.
Fandom; Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Title; Faded Hearts
Characters; Xander, Cordelia, some Jesse and Willow
Pairing; Xander/Cordelia, mentions of brief Xander/Willow
Rating; PG
Disclaimer; So not mine it's almost funny. I'm just playing around.
Summary; "Cordelia Chase, Xander had decided sometime in junior high, was quite possibly the worst girl in the universe."
Notes; Written in mostly two sittings. The songs may not fit with the fiction pieces, but just ignore that, k? Lots of love for
bringthewonder for hand-holding and song searching with me.
A, B, C // Jackson Five
you went to school to learn, girl/things you never, never knew before/like i before e except after c/and why 2 plus 2 makes four/now now now, i’m gonna teach you/teach you, teach you/all about love, dear/all about love
“Do you want to play house with me?” Xander recognizes the girl, think’s she’s in Miss Marker’s first grade class. He wouldn’t forget hair like that, hanging around her elbows in one long sheet of brown just the right color of chocolate. The stark white ribbon holding it back off her face is crooked and Xander almost opens his mouth to tell her before something pinches his arm.
“Ow!” He turns his attention back to Willow who is blinking at him with big, hurt eyes. He thinks, unfairly, that Willow’s hair doesn’t look nearly as soft as the other girls. But she’s his best friend, best girl friend but they aren’t dating anymore because he stole her Barbie last week. The new girl gives an impatient huff and Xander turns back to her. “Um, sorry. We’re playing doctor.”
She ignores his words and holds out her hand. “Come on. I’m Cordelia. We can play under the slide.” She smiles, big and white like the toothpaste commercials on TV and Xander doesn’t really know what to do.
“He said no!” Willow shouts, then immediately covers her mouth, eyes growing even wider. Cordelia finally turns her gaze on Willow and Xander thinks she doesn’t look so nice anymore.
“He your boyfriend?”
“N-no he’s n-not but we’re-” Willow hasn’t stammered like that in a long time and Xander reaches over to hold her hand. She blushes but Xander think’s there might be a smile edging it’s way up around the nervous twist of her lips.
Cordelia sniffs and by the time Xander turns toward the noise she’s running back to the slides, crying. He isn’t sure what he did but he thinks it might be important, somehow.
Seventy Times Seven // Brand New
as if it happening wasn't enough/i got to go and write a song/just to remind myself how bad it sucked/ignore the sun, covers over my head/wrote a message on my pillow that says/"Jesse, stay asleep in bed"/don't apologize/search your cell for something which to hang yourself/they say you need to pray/if you want to go to heaven/but they don't tell you what to say/when your whole life has gone to Hell!
Cordelia Chase, Xander had decided sometime in junior high, was quite possibly the worst girl in the universe. Leggy and brunette and entirely too attractive for Xander’s own good, not to mention the ease with which she tore him into little, bloody Xander-shaped scraps.
“Harsh, man,” Jesse said, mouth full of something no longer recognizable. “You need to learn to talk to the ladies.”
Xander curled protectively around the place in his stomach where he was sure his ego once lived. There was possibly a huge hole there, though it didn’t seem to be bleeding. Cordelia would never be so merciful as to actually kill one of her victims.
“Dude,” Jesse hissed, staring somewhere over Xander’s shoulder. Turning, Xander was met with the sight of his tormentor, staring at him like she was actually sorry. It lasted only a few heartbeats before her features reassembled themselves into a steely glare. Xander bit back the urge to hide.
“She was totally checking me out, right?” Xander stared at Jesse, one eyebrow raised but Jesse didn’t have the sense to deflate. “Yeah, she totally was.”
Xander almost wished she had been. It would be less confusing than a Cordelia Chase with remorse.
Strange Love // Goo Goo Dolls
you're likin' what I say/guess I was afraid you'd run away now/i'm loyal like a stray/never gonna turn and run away now/a passion junkie's fix is never satisfied/you're never gonna break his heart so have some fun abuse it
Cordelia doesn’t know how this happened. Xander’s mouth tastes like chocolate and he’s softer than her usual kind of guy but she isn’t pulling away. She’s tugging him closer, nails scraping over his scalp and shoulder. There’s competition in the way their mouths move, harsh and sharp like the words they throw at each other in the public. Desperate, like the ache of hunger in her heart.
“Wait, wait,” she gasps, and he’s across the closet in a second, chest rising and falling. She blinks, remembers how much more difficult it has been to slow things down with other boys and she’s laughing, hand over her mouth and breath catching. Xander Harris, everyone’s white knight.
Xander sneers, suddenly, and moves to leave. Cordelia reaches out, snags his shirt. “No, where are you-”
“Look,” he snaps, eyes dragging along her face with a spark that makes her hands tremble. “I’m not going to be part of some project for you, okay? No more closets and-” He waves his hand vaguely towards her and she shakes her head, opens her mouth to deny, finds it bone dry. “Whatever this is. I’m not some dirty little secret.”
She flinches, humor gone, if it was ever really there. “Xander, I’m not,” she pauses, holds her hands towards him, palms out like she’s calming a wild animal. “You have to understand.”
His laugh is humorless, his smile is self-deprecating. “That’s the point. I do understand.”
After he leaves Cordelia stays, trying to figure out when she became the heartless bitch from all the movies.
If she had to estimate, it was first grade, under the slides when Harmony Kendall helped her make fun of Willow Rosenburg.
Your Heart Is An Empty Room // Death Cab for Cutie
home's face: how it ages when you're away/spring blooms and you find the love that's true/but you don't know what now to do/‘cause the chase is all you know/and she stopped running months ago
“You have to ask me on a date,” Cordelia says, hands on her hips and towering over Xander like the queen she is.
“Um,” Xander says, clearly, and she rolls her eyes.
“If we’re doing this,” she waves her hand, an echo of a gesture he remembers making, “then we’re doing it right. I have a reputation to maintain.”
“Uh,” he adds, and she sighs. It doesn’t happen in slow motion, no, doesn’t speed up, Cordelia is leaning down at a perfectly normal pace and Xander manages to gather enough sense to kiss her back, hands loose in his lap as she pulls away, her eyes a confusing mixture of amusement and sadness.
“I’m giving a hell of a lot up for you, Xander Harris. Make it worth my time.”
It’s Beginning to Get to Me // Snow Patrol
are you beginning to get my point/that all this fighting with aching joints/it's doing nothing but tire us out/no one knows what this fight's about
Xander has never seen Cordelia cry. He know why, now. Her face is blotchy, mascara smeared around red rimmed eyes and two points of high color on her cheeks. She wipes at her eyes, spreading the line of black along her cheek. He wants to reach out and wipe it away. He doesn’t, bites his tongue, steadies himself with that pain.
“Cordelia,” he starts, flinches at her glare. He wants to fix this, wants to crack a joke that can make up for a misplaced kiss and a month of lies. “I’m sorry,” he says instead, bouquet of daisies limp between his sweating palms.
“Get out, Xander,” she says, voice wet and broken. Her hand shakes where it rests over the bandage on her abdomen. It isn’t the only sign of his mistake, but it’s the one that Cordelia will carry for the rest of her life.
He wonders, masochistically, if she’ll appreciate it as a reminder of his failure or hate it for the memory of her love.
11:11 P.M. // All American Rejects
space for thinking/space to scream to/but the echoes sound like you/not the stars at night/in a pitch black sky/i don't know just want to see you/but the time is right and it only flies
When Xander answers the door Cordelia is standing on his porch. She’s smiling, soft and careful, and he smiles back, unsurprised. “You heading out now?” he asks, takes in the rented car on his street and the sandals on her feet.
Cordelia never did like to drive in heels.
“Yeah,” she says, looking away. “L.A. fits me better than Sunnydale.” There it is, the haughty toss of her head and the steel in her spine. Not his Cordelia anymore.
She’s magnificent, and Xander wishes he could fix this, make her stay, make her want to stay. She doesn’t belong here like he does, though. She’s too big, too much for the life of a wannabe superhero.
“I’ll miss you,” he says instead of the pleading words running through his mind. “Take care of yourself.”
She laughs, bright and clear. Suddenly she’s right there, arms flung around Xander’s neck and mouth against his, a brief press of contact. Then she’s gone, walking the stride of a supermodel, an actress, a woman. “Don’t call me,” she calls back, but the words don’t sting with the taste of forgiveness she left on his lips.
He still sort of loves Cordelia even as she drives away.