Disclaimers: Joss owns them all, lucky lucky man.

Spoilers: Yup, if you haven't seen 'The Body' then don't read on because you MAY guess what happens.

Feedback: Sure thing, be nice, be nasty, I'm big and bad, I can take it. -|- Miss K -|-

 

Never Be The Same

 

Automatic pilot.

I walk to my seat with Dawn.

I sense the other people in the Church but I don't see them.

 

Automatic pilot.

 

I sit.

We sing.

People talk.

 

'...Sorry... what a terrible loss... she'll be missed...'

 

I hear all these words.

But they're just fractions of sentences.

I'm looking at a candle to the side of the altar.

It's burning out.

Someone should go and empty some of the wax from it because it can't burn out!

If it burns out it's terrible.

I pray to God to keep the little candle alight until we get out of the church.

Until we're gone

It's disrespectful if it goes out.

It can't go out.

That's a candle for my mom.

It can't go out.

 

'She'll be missed...loved by her family... wonderful person...'

 

More fragments of sentences that I don't really hear.

Should I be listening to this?

Eulogies, Hymns, readings.

Words, just words.

They all seem empty.

They can't convey what I'm feeling.

You can't squish my mom's life into 45 minutes.

 

And I check on the little candle.

It's ok.

And I say a little thanks to whoever is keeping it alight.

Dawn clutches my hand tight.

I look at her.

She's so young.

And now there's just me and I have to be everything.

 

Just me.

 

But I don't think just me will be enough for her.

And as I turn back to face the alter the pall bearers remove the cloth from the coffin.

It slides off in slow motion.

 

Slow

Motion

 

And I can't breath.

My mom's in that coffin.

I'm shaking.

 

Shaking.

 

My mom's in there I want to scream!

 

She's dead right?

I mean, what if she's still alive?

Has someone checked to make sure she is dead?

 

HELLMOUTH PEOPLE, we are on a Hellmouth, did someone check her?

 

My eyes are locked wide as they lift it up on their shoulders.

 

My mom's in that coffin and I want her back.

I just want her to come back.

 

We're going to put her in a cold hole in the ground.

She'll be so lonely.

I don't want her to go.

Not into a hole in the ground.

 

I can feel all my emotions drifting round me like a mist

A heavy thick mist.

And it's swimming round me and I just want someone to open a door in my head and let it all out because it's suffocating.

 

Dawn's hand is still in mine.

She turns to me and says something.

But I don't hear her.

Her lips are moving but I don't hear her.

I blink in slow motion.

I feel like I'm in the shoot out scene in a gangster movie.

Everything's in black and white and at a quarter speed.

 

I look at Dawnie, little Dawnie, her eyes are flooded with tears.

But I still don't hear her.

I'm shaking and I can't breath.

I am gripping my tissue so hard that my fingers have given up wanting blood.

 

The coffin moves past us.

 

Mommy?

 

And then, like magic, the spell breaks.

 

I start to sob.

Just sob, everything seeps out of me.

The warm tears wash down my face.

Warm tears for my mom, for Dawnie and for me.

Tears for us all.

 

The little candle catches my eye and it's gone out.

Extinguished..

 

Dawn holds me and I know that nothing will ever be the same.