Title: How Far The Apple Falls
Length: 400 words
Rating: G
Disclaimers: stuff from the eps "Angel" and "Inside Out"
Summary: two mirrored scenes: Angel and Darla - Connor and Darla
You show up in your plaid-print skirt; Buffy’s in the other corner, looking like a hooker in those painted on pants. The sparkles in her shirt catch the light. Madonna and whore face off, and Angel is on point. He is wearing black. The specter of Joyce hangs between you. You always did love a symmetrical set-up: two mothers, a virgin and a monster.
You’re still high on Joyce’s blood. You wanted Angel to taste it, the fall, fruit off the vine. You opened his window to reality; he hid in his knowledge of shame. You opened his refrigerator to truth hanging in bags like bats, forbidden knowledge of who he really is. You know him better than anyone will ever know him. Make him swallow it down, chew-‘cause he’s not exactly living off quiche.
He’s living above ground, like one of them. He’s attacking you, like one of them. But no matter what he does, it’s not who he is. You assume that Angel can only suppress his true nature for so long. He doesn’t have a choice. He’s being hunted like an animal.
Instead, Angel turns from the virgin and kills his maker.
There was a time when you shared everything, it occurs to you, as you fall to dust. This is how he repays you.
x
You show up spectral in white; Cordelia’s in black. Shadows paint her purple, and Connor is wearing gray. The virgin in question, hanging between you by her hands, looks like the schoolgirl. Apparently, “always” can be a short time, because you don’t love symmetrical so much now, do you.
You might, just a bit, be from on high. But despite the white, you’re no blessed virgin mother, and this time, you’re not making any assumptions. You just want him to have a glimpse of light, of your love. You want Connor to know he has a choice, even when he’s being hunted down.
They’re afraid of him because of what he does, you tell him. Not who he is. Because you know him better than anyone will ever know him. He rolled away the rocks in your heart; he, your beautiful boy, came to life in the empty tomb of you. You shared everything; you fell to dust to lift him up. You would die every day for all eternity to do it again.
Instead, Connor turns from his mother and kills the virgin.
This is how he repays you.