TITLE: Make It Go Away
AUTHOR: Karen U
E-MAIL: ksu2@juno.com
RATING: PG-13
CONTENT: very minor language, the rating's mostly due to themes
SPOILERS: Post Restless, set in the fall of 2000
CATEGORY: Willow/Graham
FEEDBACK: Yes, but no flames
DISTRIBUTION: Charity, Graham Crackers, Tempation Embraced, W/Gr
DISCLAIMER: All BtVS characters belong to Joss Whedon, the WB, and Fox
AUTHOR'S NOTES: In this fic, I'm pretending that Graham lives in a single
room in one of the dorms
MORE NOTES: This scene just popped into my head (I don't know why), and it
wouldn't go away, so in an effort to get it out of my system, I wrote it
down. Sorry if it sucks.

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~

The knock on his door startled him.

Graham had been preparing for bed - he had, in fact, been in the process of
stripping down to his boxers - when the unexpected visitor arrived. His
brow furrowed in confusion when he glanced at the clock, noting that it was
after two in the morning, far too late for a casual visit. This had to be
important, and it most likely meant he would be expected to get dressed and
run off to fight evil. Damn it, he was tired. Couldn’t the evil wait until
morning?

Sighing in resignation, Graham pulled a pair of sweatpants on over his
boxers, just in case it was Buffy that was at his door. Riley’s girlfriend
certainly wasn’t what Graham would refer to as modest or prone to
embarrassment when it came to the male form, but that didn’t mean he was
going to give her a free show. With another sigh - this one more annoyed
than resigned - and a slight shake of his head, Graham went to open his
door.

And got one of the biggest shocks of his life.

It wasn’t the Slayer standing there at his door pumped up for a fight, but
Willow. And she was crying. The tiny redhead stood with her arms wrapped
around herself and her head down, but he could still the tell-tale shaking
of her shoulders that meant tears.

“Willow?” he said questioningly, torn about what to do. Though he had been
helping the Slayer and her group for awhile now, he hadn’t gotten to know
Willow very well. Correction - he hadn’t let himself get to know her very
well. And there was a reason for that. His attraction to her. He’d felt
it ever since the first time he had worked with Buffy’s friends, and he had
purposely kept his distance from her because of it. Well, not because of
the attraction per se, but because of the fact that he could do nothing
about it. Willow was taken, actually dating someone else, and that meant
she was off limits. At first, he had consoled himself with the knowledge
that the fact that the ‘someone else’ was a woman probably meant that he’d
have never had a chance with her anyway, but then Riley had told him the
story of Oz, and he’d realized that maybe, just maybe, if Tara were out of
the picture, he would have had a chance with the redhead. The same redhead
who was now standing outside his door, crying, and he had no idea what to do
for her.

Willow sniffled slightly as she looked up. Her eyes trailed slowly over
Graham’s bare chest, and a light blush tinged her cheeks as she met his
eyes. “Can... can I come in?” she managed, her voice soft and shaky.

Graham nodded and immediately stepped aside so she could enter, then closed
the door behind her. “What is it? Did something happen?”

The redhead shrugged as she stood in the middle of his room, looking
decidedly uncomfortable. “Not... not in the way you mean,” she said after a
moment. “Everyone’s okay and everything.”

“You’re lying,” Graham said softly. Willow’s head raised indignantly, and
he continued his statement before she could begin one of her own. “You’re
obviously not okay, and you wouldn’t have come to me if everything was all
right.”

The redhead shrugged once again at his comment, but didn’t make a movement
beyond that. Sighing, Graham reached out and took hold of her arm, leading
her to his bed, where they could both sit down and face each other.

“Look, Willow, you came here for a reason. I don’t pretend to know what
that reason is, and I can’t help you unless you talk to me.”

“I don’t know why I came here,” the redhead finally said after what seemed
like forever. “I was just walking, and... this is where I ended up. The
others... I just don’t want to face them right now.”

“Not even Tara?” The words were out before he could censor them, and he
wanted to kick himself when she lifted sad, tear-filled green eyes to meet
his.

“It’s... it’s about Tara,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper.

Oh, great. Here she was, the one woman he was currently interested in, and
she had come to him to pour her heart out about a fight with her girlfriend.
He was in hell. Cursing himself as all kinds of a fool, but knowing he
didn’t have the enough cruelty in him to leave her like this, he prepared
himself for the torture that was about to come.

“Did... did you have a fight?” he asked.

“You could say that,” Willow replied, the laugh that slipped past her lips
hollow.

“What exactly does that mean?”

“It means... we... we had a fight, but it wasn’t exactly the run-of-the-mill
lovers’ spat that you’re picturing,” she told him, too caught up in her own
pain to notice the way Graham flinched at the word ‘lover.’

“Then why don’t you tell me what it was?” he asked after a moment, his eyes
trained on the redhead sitting next to him. She sat with her arms wrapped
protectively around her body, and she was rocking slightly. The image
disturbed him greatly, though he couldn’t put his finger on the exact reason
why.

“It... she... oh, Goddess,” the redhead said in a distressed voice before
pausing to get a grip on both her thoughts and her emotions. After a
moment, she spoke again, this time slightly more composed. “Something...
something had been off recently, but I didn’t know what it was. So... so I
went to Tara’s room, and I was going through her spell books, trying to find
something that would help. A cleansing spell or something. I thought it
might help with my discontent.”

“What did you find?” Graham asked when she stopped, still afraid it would
turn into a scorned lover story with Willow walking in and finding Tara in
bed with someone else. The redhead’s next words, however, banished that
thought forever.

“I thought it was a spell book. I mean, there were spells in it. If I’d
known it wasn’t, I would have never... but then, if I hadn’t read it, I
would have never found out what she was doing to me.”

{...what she was doing to me...} The words echoed through Graham’s head and
chilled his blood. Carefully, so as not to frighten her, he reached for
Willow, turning her so that she was facing him completely.

“What was she doing to you?” he asked, speaking slowly, enunciating each
word carefully in an effort to control his voice and keep from screaming.
What had that bitch done to his Willow? Well, not his Willow, but, oh, damn
it, he knew what he meant, and he didn’t have the time or energy to unravel
it in his mind. Right now, he had to find out what had happened to the
redhead in front of him.

“I never really loved her, you know?” Willow began in a soft, far away voice
that Graham found infinitely creepy. It was almost as if she wasn’t there
with him anymore, but was instead somewhere far away that he couldn’t reach.
“She made me do it. That’s all it was. Just a spell.”

“Oh, no,” Graham whispered as the first whisper of understanding made its
way to his brain.

“She did a spell, and then she was controlling me. That’s all it was. Just
a little love spell. No big deal, really,” the young witch said, but her
eyes, which were once more filled with tears, told a different story. It
was a big deal, and Willow was about to break because of it. “That’s what
it was from the start. When we started doing spells together, she found
something I left in her room accidentally, and she used it in the spell.
There were no real feelings, just a spell. Nothing more than an
incantation. I chose her over ... everything, and it was all because of a
spell.”

“How do we break it, Willow? How do we break the spell?”

“It’s done,” she said softly, lowering her eyes to the floor as the tears
began to escape. Graham made a move to reach for her, but she shifted away,
not yet ready for physical comfort. “There... there are some spells - like
protection spells - that are only effective if the person they’re cast on is
unaware of them. This particular incantation falls under that category.
So... no more spell,” she told him, her voice breaking slightly at the end.

“Why?” Graham muttered, almost to himself. “Why would she do this?”

“After... after the whole ‘you’ve been controlling me’ argument, I really
wasn’t up to listening to her reasons, but... she said she... she did it for
me, for us, but if there was supposed to be an us, wouldn’t it have happened
on it’s own? She said she did it because she wanted me so much, and she
thought it was the only way she could get me.” Willow looked up then, her
tear-drenched green eyes boring into his blue ones. “Is that supposed to
make me feel flattered or something?”

“No, it’s not,” he said softly, wanting to reach for her once more but
afraid she would just pull away again.

“Oh, Goddess... I just can’t believe this is happening,” the redhead said,
resuming the rocking that she had momentarily abandoned as her eyes fell
from his face. “I just... I keep remembering everything... all the things
we did, and I just... oh, Goddess... I was being controlled! I didn’t have
a choice but to do what she wanted me to! And everything I did... and
now.... I know I would have never done any of those things... But I didn’t
have a choice, and now...I just feel so violated...”

Her voice seemed to break into a million pieces on the word ‘violated,’ as
did her control. Her shoulders shook violently as heart-wrenching sobs
seemed to tear their way out of her, and Graham immediately reached for her,
yanking her into his arms as she sobbed out her pain and betrayal. The
thought of the ‘things’ she had done - no, been forced to due because of a
spell - that were now leaving Willow feeling violated made his stomach turn,
and he silently cursed the blonde witch who had done this to the redhead.

After awhile, the girl in his arms began to quiet, and Graham felt her shift
a bit, her lips brushing his throat, and... oh, man, had she just kissed his
neck? Carefully, he set her slightly away from him, keeping her in his arms
but still far enough away from him that he could look down into her face.
He was stunned by the look of need in her eyes.

“Please, Graham,” she whispered, lifting her hand to touch his lips, then
his cheeks. “Please, just make it go away. Just make it all go away.”
That said, she pressed her lips to his, surprising him with her hunger. Her
mouth devoured his, and he moaned under the onslaught, opening his mouth so
that his tongue dueled with hers. He felt her hands slide up his chest and
lock around his neck, and he tightened his arms around her, pulling her so
close she was actually sitting in his lap. His hands began to explore her
body of their own volition, and he reveled in the feel of her.

{... just make it all go away...} The words crashed back to him, and he
immediately broke the kiss, lifting his head to stare down at her. Dear
Lord, what the hell was he doing? Trying to clear his mind, he gazed down
at Willow, taking in her dazed look and slightly parted lips. She was
breathing heavily, and her heart was pounding... right... under... his...
hand. Graham’s eyes widened as he realized that some way, somehow, his hand
had found its way under her shirt, and he was currently toying with the lacy
material of Willow’s bra. Horrified by his own actions, he quickly pulled
his hand away.

“Graham?” Willow finally asked, her voice uncertain.

“We... oh, man. This... we can’t do this Willow. It’s not that-”

“It’s okay. I understand,” the redhead said as she quickly removed herself
from his lap. “You don’t have to explain. You don’t want me.”

Before he even noticed that he was moving, Graham was off the bed, reaching
Willow before she even made it to the door. He pulled her into his arms,
her back pressed against his chest and leaned down so his lips were near her
ear. “I want you. I can’t begin to tell you how much I want you.” As he
spoke the words, he realized that, with
Willow pressed flush against him, she was probably feeling his body’s
declaration of just how much he wanted her.

“Then why...?” She trailed off, unable to complete her question.

“Because you’re hurt, and you’re scared, and it isn’t right, at least not
yet. You just told me how violated Tara made you feel,” he told her, simply
tightening his grip when she stiffened in his arms. “I couldn’t bear it if
we did this, if we made this rash decision, and you woke up feeling violated
by me. I care too much about you, Willow. And I know you’re not ready for
this. Not right now. Not tonight But later, when you’ve had time to deal
with things...” He trailed off as he turned her around in his arms and
looked into her face. She was still crying, but her face didn’t hold the
terrible embarrassment that it had just moments before. Gently, he reached
up and stroked her face, pleased when she closed her eyes and leaned in to
his touch. “I do want you, Willow. But we both now that tonight isn’t
right. Too much has happened... You have so much to deal with... you’re
just not ready. But I’ll help you through it, and when you’re ready, I’ll
still be here. Okay?”

Willow nodded slowly, tears still streaming down her cheeks, but she seemed
much calmer, and the hopelessness he had seen earlier was no longer in her
eyes. “Okay.”

“Come on,” Graham urged, turning around and leading her to the bed. “You
can stay here tonight.”

Willow sat down slowly, then kicked off her shoes before lying down and
getting under the covers. Graham turned off his lamp, then lay down beside
her, still wearing his sweatpants, and he pulled her close, fitting her
against his side. The redhead curled into him, her face pressed to his
chest as the last of her tears made their way down her cheeks.

Graham lay in the darkness, listening as Willow’s soft crying turned to the
deep breathing of sleep. He held her protectively against his body, not
wanting to let go of her, enjoying the feel of her silky hair against his
bare chest. He sighed as he shifted slightly, wondering just what was going
to happen now. With him, with Willow, with Tara. The bitch deserved to be
drawn and quartered for what she had done to Willow, damn it. Of course,
Willow would probably balk at that idea; she wasn’t exactly one prone to
violence. Smiling slightly at the thought of the redhead, he looked down at
the woman in his arms who was now sleeping peacefully. His smile faded as
he contemplated what the future would bring, knowing that Willow had a long
road ahead of her. But he would be there for her.

Every step of the way.

The End