TITLE: Some Minutes
AUTHOR: Gabriele Schulz
EMAIL: gabi@gschulz.de
RATING: PG
DISTRIBUTION: Everyone who has my general permission. Others please ask first.
SPOILERS: Intervention
FEEDBACK: Love it. Especially if you like the story ;-)
SUMMARY: Giles remembers his dead wife...
COUPLES: Buffy/Giles, Giles/Xander
DISCLAIMER: The characters are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Sandollar Productions, Kuzui Enterprises, 20th Century Fox Television, the WB Television Network, and whoever else may have a hold on them. I do not mean to infringe upon any copyrights.
NOTES:
Ican't really explain how I came up with this one. Sometimes pain comes from nowhere. Thank God for fic. It really is a catalyst. The title is a reference to Intervention where Buffy says something like "some minutes are harder than others" when Giles asks her how she is coping with her mothers death.
DATE: 05/05/2001

He didn't know what it was. It wasn't her birthday nor any other anniversary. Nothing of the things that would remind him of her in a way that made it difficult to think of the happy times they had. That was how he usually remembered her. In the sun, laughing, full of live. Maybe it was because he was alone in their home, although he was so on other occasions and still it wouldn't...hurt so much. He hardly ever felt this way. Not even shortly after she had been killed. But right now his throat was sore, tears fighting to come out. He didn't want to cry. He knew that he had no reason. He had two wonderful children and a partner who loved him more than anything and whom he loved back whole-heartedly. And Buffy had had a happy life. She had told him time and again, that he shouldn't be sad when she died, because even in the short time they had been given, she had had more happiness in her life than many others got in fifty years. And still in this second the pain was suddenly almost unbearable.

The door to their home opened.

"Rupert, I'm back. And you won't believe it, but I successfully talked Liz out of- Rupert, what's wrong?"

Xander rushed to him.

"It..."

He didn't want to cry. The pain was bad enough, but he didn't want to lay it on Xander of all people. He loved him so much and he didn't want to put him into the position of comforting his lover over his dead wife. But when Xander took his face in his hands and forced him to look into the brown eyes, he saw nothing but love and understanding. And then he simply couldn't hold back the tears any longer.

Xander pulled Giles into his arms and let him cry over the woman they had all loved so much. He wasn't jealous of her. He had never been after they were out of High School. When they had become a couple he had known that Rupert would never forget Buffy. But that had never been an issue for him, because he would never forget her, either. In all those years since he had first met Buffy and Giles he had learned that there was always more love to give. You didn't have to stop loving someone to love someone else.

Rupert was calming in his arms. The sobs were slowly subsiding. Finally he looked up and wiped his eyes.

"I love you, Xander."

Xander smiled. It wasn't that he didn't know that. Others had had and still had their doubts about Giles' feelings for him, but he and their closest friends and Buffy and Giles' children knew the truth. Rupert had loved Buffy with an almost painful intensity. And even though he still loved her, he now loved Xander as much. But even though he knew it, hearing it always made him smile.

"I love you, too."

He bent forward and kissed him tenderly.

Giles closed his eyes. He sometimes wondered how he had deserved to find true love not only once, but twice. The sharp pain in his heart was gone. He could now picture Buffy and it was a fond memory again and not aching. Then the picture was gone and he concentrated on the man in his arms, the lips on his lips... his love.

Some minutes were harder than others. But as sure as they would never cease to come they always went away again. What remained was love. And that made even the hard times bearable.

The END