Life’s Labors
By: spoiledsquish
Disclaimer: Not mine. If I did, do you honestly believe I would tear Fresley and B/A apart?
Author's Note: Just a little Fresley fic I decided to write. This isn’t my first Fresley fic I’ve written, but it is the first I’ve posted.
Distribution: My site, Seductive Web, PPA, Enchanting Place, Fanfiction.net, WTTS, PFYL, TEF, Sempiternal Beloved...If you host my fics regularly, feel free. If you don’t, just ask and most likely you shall receive.
Summary: After Not Fade Away, Fred thinks about her own life, and the life she shared with her soulmate.
Pairings: W/F, with a tiny mention of B/A.
Rating: PG-13.
Spoilers: Not Fade Away; Fred didn’t die, and basically Illyria never existed, as she is not mentioned.
Timeline: Almost two years after Not Fade Away.
Dedication: For Edel, who just encourages my Fresley fix. Love you!
It’s been 548 days, 11 hours, 37 minutes, and 26 seconds since my life has ended. It’s been that long since I’ve felt the excruciating smell of death and decay.
No, I’m not dead, but I might as well be.
My name is Winnifred Burkle, and on May 19th, 2004, the love of my life, my soulmate, Wesley Wyndham Pryce, was killed in battle.
And he did it all for the sake of his best friend. I mean, how more heroic can you get?
I found Wesley just as he was getting ready to take his dying breath. I was too late. I had managed to fend off Izzy and his gang when I felt this pain in my gut.
When I got there, it was too late. Vail had already gotten to my love, and I found him lying on the ground, trying to breathe.
I think sometimes that he was waiting for me to find him, so that I could say goodbye. Other days, my mind tells me it’s just wishful thinking. Honestly, I’m not sure which is the honest truth anymore.
His death was not in vain, that I know for certain. I guess you could say Vail finally got what was coming to him afterwards.
Some wise person once said that love makes you do the wacky.
I guess none of us really know how true that statement is until we experience the notion of it firsthand. When I was little, I used to think that love was just something in fairytales, or something that grownups used to describe their partners when the children were around.
I know now that, like I once told Angel, love is everything. The romantic child in me told him that at first because I had the hugest crush on him when I first met him. I guess I never really realized how precious and rare true love is until you have it.
Most people never experience that feeling, and those who do don’t really ever realize how precious the rarity of finding your soulmate is. So, if you are able to experience that feeling, all I have to say is don’t ever waste it.
I know that Wesley would want me to move forward, and find someone else. Little did he know that there will never be another one for me. He was it. I’m not going to say that I’m doomed and I’ll never fall in love again, because truly, none of us know that for certain. I’m sure that somewhere, down the road, I’ll feel some sort of feeling towards them, but I know that it can’t ever replace my soulmate.
Wesley was my constant and now he’s gone. And I’m here, alone. Sure, Gunn and Spike stop by every now and then, and every once in a while I’ll see Angel when he’s managed to get away from the happiness that he and Buffy now share with their own son, Michael, but it’s not enough.
It doesn’t bring back Wesley and sure as hell won’t bring back the part of me that died with my beloved.
But I have to move forward, but never forget. Sometimes life throws a curveball or two at you, and you just have to roll with the punches.
Whoever wrote that life is like a box of chocolates was a seriously disturbed person. Life is pain, and suffering, and every once in a while, life is love. Life is passion, the air you breathe, life is simple.
Most importantly, life is living.
-Fin