Dawn starts writing old-fashioned letters with stamps and envelopes and sends them in brown packages along with candies or flyers for parties or ticket stubs or beer coasters or a paper with a big red “A” on the front.
Tara finds Buffy one day standing in the foyer with a package in her hands and an odd look on her face.
“What is she learning out there?” As if the entire world was hidden in the grounds of Berkeley University.
“Things you can’t teach her.”
“Did I teacher her enough?”
“You taught her what you knew.”
Two months in to her first semester Dawn gets arrested at a protest and the resulting phone call makes Buffy’s head swirl. Sam congratulates her on fighting the good fight - even though Buffy is pretty sure the whole damn thing was about a tree - Sunggyu writes her a song on youtube, Anya sniffs and waxes poetics about the beauty of capitalism, and Tara warns her to be safe.
“What is she going to teach me, next?”
“Everything she learns.”
“Will I be able to keep up?”
“Would she really let you fall behind?”
And Buffy thinks: yes. But shrugs instead.
Dawn gets in her truck with her fresh laundry and she hugs her sister goodbye and takes Tara’s arm for a minute. They watch Buffy walk back into the house.
“My wrist is better. Thank you for not telling.”
Tara’s eyes are serious, “I think what you are doing is stupid.”
Dawn smiles and thinks of the hash-marks in red on her dorm room wall, one mark for every vampire she’s caught unawares in her new town, “I’m only doing what she taught me to do.”
“Put yourself in terrible danger and possibly die?”
They don’t laugh because it isn’t a joke. It’s more true than anything else they’ve ever known.
OH, I LOVE THIS, I LOVE THIS, I LOVE EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS.
I love Dawn going off to college and nobody being able to handle it at first. Dawn freaking out and Tara and Buffy having to calm her down, only Buffy really wants to go get her and bring her home with them again. And Buffy missing her so much, the memory of her coming and sittng with her, and her forgetting that she's not there until she sees Dawn's empty room and it hurts. And she thinks Dawn, her baby sister, is passing her by, and that she's going to surpass her, and Dawn's out there learning but also doing what Buffy taught her, because she's Buffy's sister and she learned everything she could from her and uses it.
and buffy and tara wear the socks she knitted and the sweaters and its febuary and Dawn's only coming home for laundry but it all seems like so much more for all of them.
Its Dawn coming home, even if she doesn't stay.
And just all the little details, so many beautiful details, like tara's station wagon and dawn's truck and what they mean to them. and buffy who used to eat oreos in the middle of the night and dawn would sit with her after she came back. and dawn's brief knitting phase. and the reverse care packages that she sends to prove she's alright. and the little scratches on her walls for all the vampires she's killed.
and have I mentioned that I loved this? because I do, I love it so much. You did so much with it and you had dawn and buffy and buffy/tara, and its all just so perfect. I love it!
I love 'empty-nest'/daughter off to college fic! And I love sisters who suddenly grow up into different interests and I love the idea of crunchy, Berkeley-student Dawn who joins protests and kills vampires and has a 4.0 and still comes home (a VERRRRY LONG DRIVE) on her three day weekends just to do laundry.
Tara finds Buffy one day standing in the foyer with a package in her hands and an odd look on her face.
“What is she learning out there?” As if the entire world was hidden in the grounds of Berkeley University.
“Things you can’t teach her.”
“Did I teacher her enough?”
“You taught her what you knew.”
Two months in to her first semester Dawn gets arrested at a protest and the resulting phone call makes Buffy’s head swirl. Sam congratulates her on fighting the good fight - even though Buffy is pretty sure the whole damn thing was about a tree - Sunggyu writes her a song on youtube, Anya sniffs and waxes poetics about the beauty of capitalism, and Tara warns her to be safe.
“What is she going to teach me, next?”
“Everything she learns.”
“Will I be able to keep up?”
“Would she really let you fall behind?”
And Buffy thinks: yes. But shrugs instead.
Dawn gets in her truck with her fresh laundry and she hugs her sister goodbye and takes Tara’s arm for a minute. They watch Buffy walk back into the house.
“My wrist is better. Thank you for not telling.”
Tara’s eyes are serious, “I think what you are doing is stupid.”
Dawn smiles and thinks of the hash-marks in red on her dorm room wall, one mark for every vampire she’s caught unawares in her new town, “I’m only doing what she taught me to do.”
“Put yourself in terrible danger and possibly die?”
They don’t laugh because it isn’t a joke. It’s more true than anything else they’ve ever known.
“Fight.”
Reply
I love Dawn going off to college and nobody being able to handle it at first. Dawn freaking out and Tara and Buffy having to calm her down, only Buffy really wants to go get her and bring her home with them again. And Buffy missing her so much, the memory of her coming and sittng with her, and her forgetting that she's not there until she sees Dawn's empty room and it hurts. And she thinks Dawn, her baby sister, is passing her by, and that she's going to surpass her, and Dawn's out there learning but also doing what Buffy taught her, because she's Buffy's sister and she learned everything she could from her and uses it.
and buffy and tara wear the socks she knitted and the sweaters and its febuary and Dawn's only coming home for laundry but it all seems like so much more for all of them.
Its Dawn coming home, even if she doesn't stay.
And just all the little details, so many beautiful details, like tara's station wagon and dawn's truck and what they mean to them. and buffy who used to eat oreos in the middle of the night and dawn would sit with her after she came back. and dawn's brief knitting phase. and the reverse care packages that she sends to prove she's alright. and the little scratches on her walls for all the vampires she's killed.
and have I mentioned that I loved this? because I do, I love it so much. You did so much with it and you had dawn and buffy and buffy/tara, and its all just so perfect. I love it!
Reply
I love 'empty-nest'/daughter off to college fic! And I love sisters who suddenly grow up into different interests and I love the idea of crunchy, Berkeley-student Dawn who joins protests and kills vampires and has a 4.0 and still comes home (a VERRRRY LONG DRIVE) on her three day weekends just to do laundry.
Buffy/Tara domestics are the best.
Reply
Leave a comment