Fic: 'I love you' is a thing you say to people who are dying (9/16); hard R

[quinara]

[start of fic and notes]

'I love you' is a thing you say to people who are dying
by Quinara

Season 7. Buffy/Spike. Some Watchers survived, because sometimes people do.

[breakfasts III]

Comments

[the_moonmoth]

His want for her - the want he’d been so afraid of - it hadn’t killed her. It wasn’t in him to destroy her, and she’d known it, she really thought she’d known it - but now the truth was here for everyone to see.

Such an important realisation, even if that's not how the others take it.

Buffy shut her eyes. It wasn’t something she’d ever wanted Dawn to know, how many things in her life there were that were worse than bleeding.

Ugh, my babies :( very good Buffy voice.

The thing was, she was scared for him. They were in a war, but it almost didn’t seem to matter that everything in her wanted them both to survive, because time and time again, this time not least, it felt like she was the only one fighting.

And again. This is exactly her in S7.

[quinara]

I'm so glad you like Buffy here - I love her character in S7, but I also think she has gone a bit weird, so it's possible she's lying to herself throughout this whole episode - but then I'm also not sure she is, really. (Yes, I am conflicted about my own characterisation...) And I'll say it again that you are so sweet for leaving so many comments - thanks!

[the_moonmoth]

Giiiiiiirl, writing of this quality deserves all the love <3 <3 <3 And you could've posted it one chapter a week to get more comments, but you didn't, and I appreciate that on many levels :)

[quinara]

Would that I could! This is a reply to one of your other comments as well, really, about how I could be in the headspace to produce more stuff after posting, but the basic fact is that I obsess and obsess and obsess. Once the grip of finishing something comes on me, WOE BETIDE the world that tries to get in the way. I always do my final edits in the posting window, but once I start on that process I get into this mindset of tinkering, and it's very hard to switch off until it's all done. And even then I keep bothering myself about it until it's finished (to my satisfaction, of course, which is how you managed to catch me, because I wasn't yet satisfied but had given in). I've never been any good at posting while I write, because I go back and change so much in random places as things develop, so I've sort of come to accept that I will always post things in the most socially awkward way possible, and then people may or may not read them eventually

[the_moonmoth]

Welp. I think it comes down to what you're writing for, and I freely admit that I lose sight of this sometimes, but good writing - the best writing - comes from the author writing it for their own satisfaction, and not for comments, recs or accolades. Time was, I never posted WIPs, and then I only posted short things as WIPs, and then the short WIPs grew legs and spines and galloped away over the horizon, and here I sit with a bunch of unfinished WIPs to my name, some lovely comments, and a gnawing feeling of dissatisfaction and failure :-/ I admire your forbearance, is what I'm saying ;) When I was first in fandom, WIPs were kind of frowned on (in my circles, at least); these days it seems they're the norm. But for me, something that I miss is knowing that a favourite author has something big they're working on, and then getting to binge-read it. When the writing is really quality stuff (as yours is) being able to absorb all the themes and ideas and suggestions all in one go is the majority of my enjoyment factor, and it was really