The words echoed slowly through my mind amidst the thumping of the rubber ball on my ceiling and my ever-present country music. Tanya Tucker was singing about how silence is king, and I had to admit that she’s right.
Willow and I hadn’t spoken in two weeks. The Ascension had come and gone, and so had Cordelia and Angel. I missed Cordelia more than I thought. I even called her the night before she left and made peace with her. It’s good that she left when we were friends. But Willow. . . It felt like Willow and I would never be friends again. She was so wrapped up in Oz. She thought I didn’t know. But I did. I could see the difference. She should have told me; I shouldn’t have had to rely on intuition. But we couldn’t even talk to each other anymore.
The lyrics wove in and out of my mind as I thought about our first conversation since before the Ascension. She’d told me she missed me. And I told her there was a solution to that. She didn’t want to hear it. But I told her anyway.
“The only way we can be friends again is if you and Oz break up. Since that isn’t likely to happen, I’ll be saying good-bye now.”
She’d screamed at me, hurled the damned ball at my head even. She’d cried and yelled and even swore at me. Told me *I* was the asshole for expecting her to give up someone she loved just because I finally woke up. Well, I’m sorry. I’m not the most observant guy in the world. I proved that time and time again. Am I supposed to rewind time so that I could figure it out before Oz and Cordelia entered the picture? If things worked that way, then we’d all live happily ever after. But they don’t. I finally realized how I felt, it was just a little late. I’m not known for my timing. So I screwed up, yet again. How many times in my life am I going to be punished for the same thing?
Tanya’s husky voice had faded away by then and a new song had already started. Clint Black, I thought. It worried me to know that I could recognize a country song just by listening to a few notes.
I groaned and threw the ball harder. Why is it that every single time something bad happens, it’s like there’s a soundtrack to my life that corresponds perfectly with what I’m feeling? Sometimes it feels like I’m part of some angsty teen TV show with a carefully selected soundtrack. Moment of torture, matched ballad. Moment of success and accomplishment accompanied by a victorious theme song. “Half the Man.” One of my old favorites of Clint’s, until he started singing it for me. No kidding, she’s half the man I am. I couldn’t be anything that I’ve become if it wasn’t for her love and support.
Throwing the ball around was getting old, so I got up and paced. My radio seemed to keep pace with me, and Clint just kept on twisting the knife.
My pacing slowed as I listened to the lyrics; actually listened to what it was they were trying to tell me. “He’s right,” I acknowledged. A slow burning started in my heart and a fierce determination rose up within me. “I’ve never been a quitter. I have to get her back,” I vowed. “She’s a part of me, and I’m a part of her. No matter how much she loves Oz, she knows that we’re already destined to be together.”
I looked at myself in the mirror and realized I needed to clean up a little bit. After about ten minutes of changing and taking care of the basic hygiene, I was running out the door. Will had promised to watch her next-door neighbor’s kids for the afternoon, so I headed in the direction of her house. “I have to talk to her,” I whispered to myself. “We have to figure out, once and for all, what’s going on with us.”