[fic] no lies, no apologies

[kwritten]

fic: no lies, no apologies
fandom: btvs
pairing: buffy/tara
word count: 2,000
setting: an au in which Dead Things ends just slightly differently
note: inspired by a conversation had with red_satin_doll about the tropes that are used in bara fic. WARNING: this is *not* the bara that you may be used to. not too sure about the ending, but ... it is what it is

Comments

[kwritten]

(in the universal sense and I suspect the deeply personal sense of you and I, Kelsey
deeply, deeply personal to me.

There was a meta that I think you recommended a while back about Tara - and it looked at her actions a bit more harshly, pointing out the times when she wasn't a "good" person in the way that so often fandom wants to believe her to be. And the thing that struck me in that essay - was *not* that Tara's behavior was ... a bit more destructive/manipulative/abusive than I usually think of her - but that everything that author pointed to as being abusive behavior *I* read as defense mechanisms of an abused person?

Tara was abused her whole life by her family and then by Willow - and so it makes sense to me that she would begin to lash out in ways that are not ... good or "kind" ways. Because all she has known is abuse.

And I just think that we need to start paying more attention to how abuse-victims react in abusive environments. Because I understand that a Willow-sympathizer would want to say "yes, but Tara was NOT the emotional beacon of goodwill that people say she is" ... but I'm also EXTREMELY uncomfortable with labeling a victim's defense mechanisms and trained behavior as abuse? Because I feel like it takes some of the responsibility off of Willow for the way that she treated Tara? And as a person with an abusive family home who was in a relationship for a long time that reads and looks very similar to Willow/Tara - I *can* acknowledge that my learned-behavior can, to an outsider, appear as 'equal abuse' when it is not? IDK that to me feels like a kind of victim-blaming? That after all this time she shouldn't have picked up behavior that protects herself. Or picked up behavior that is abusive - but only because that's the only thing that she knows? but it also is (probably) unfair to presume that Tara - or a person like this - doesn't have SOME responsibility?

IT'S A TRICKY LINE AND I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH IT?

And in a former FaB fic, I tried really hard to get at what it feels like to be the person who is always trying to be good and judges themself more harshly than they would someone else - but I think that I was actually able to capture that a bit more here.

Tara - in asking Buffy to ask her to stay - is being highly manipulative. And she is doing something 'good' because she wants something. And PEOPLE DO THAT. And I can't think of that as a 'bad' behavior when it is a learned, taught, and constructed behavior that shields people.

this girl - in which goodness is a mask
One of the things that I was trying to show was that - doing good for good's sake (which is what I think Tara does a great deal of the time) can actually lead to hurt.
"and taught her only hate and loathing in return for her need"
that being the person who always does the right thing and is good and kind DOES NOT GUARANTEE that the world will give you the same treatment in return. there are thousands/millions of women (I think especially women) who are told that they are REQUIRED to be kind to everyone - but also hurt/fractured/abused by people because of this. And that leads to anger.

If you are always good because you were told to be good and you know no other way to live than to be soft and good, but the world just keeps battering at you, you will strike out in ways that end up hurting people because you know no other alternative. And that's the kind of person I think Tara is. She's not doing good to get something in return - but she's old enough and has been hurt enough times to understand that giving doesn't and won't put her ever in a situation where people won't just keep taking and hurting her.

We want to believe that our social code ensures that if you are kind to people, that they will be kind back. Tara has learned - any number of times - that this is not true. That if you hold out your hand and lift someone else, they will not necessarily do the same for you. And that's painful and that's hurtful. and that doesn't mean she'll stop being kind and good when she can - but it is a fracturing sort of existence.

people like Tara? they can be used up, lose their energy, give and give and give until there is nothing left for themselves.