Hiraeth (pronounced [hiraɪ̯θ])

  AUTHOR: kerk_hiraeth

  FANDOM: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (FemaleHusband!verse)

  CHARACTERS: Faith Lehane; Tara Maclay; Buffy Summers;

  'SHIP(s): Faith/Tara; Buffy/Angel;

  LENGTH: 200; 

  RATING: R (for strong language); 

  A/N: Set in the FemaleHusband!verse (centred around a Faith/Tara relationship); this may be the start of a new series within that 'verse.

         The idea for this began in another fandom altogether; another poet too. My mind was on a Korean web series called She Makes My Heart Flutter released in November; also on the characters of Yun Sol & Seo Ji-wan and their friends Yu Na-bi & Oh Bit-na, from another Korean series, Nevertheless.

        Most of the story in the former takes place in a bar named after Emily Dickinson, but the original thought; which will likely inspire stories, evolved into stories inspired by Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnets from the Portuguese.

       There's always been the thought behind this 'verse that; even though Faith & Tara become lovers; then a couple, that Faith does not see herself as a lesbian; neither does Tara. I've always wanted to explore that idea and now; finally, that may be coming to pass. Only time will tell on that, but both the title of this story, and the overall title of the series; should that happen, come from the first of the sonnets ~ a copy of which Angel gave Buffy as a gift in Helpless.

     Faith often wondered why, after she and Tara had become lovers; not friends or guarded and guard bitch, she still got creamy over dick.

  For fuck's sake; she'd teased 'B' enough times!

  But always ~ Always! ~ she'd needed to go out and fuck some piece of ass until he was barely able to function.

  She even thought of dick when she and Tara were fucking.

  Even now her brain would flood over some dick she'd fucked back in the day.

  Back in the day...

  She'd been barely a kid herself; fucking with girls to get some dick hard.

  And Tara was all woman.

  All woman.

  Stamina she had too; strapping Faith, a Slayer, until she herself could barely function.

  And what Tara could do with her...

  Fucking witchcraft was what it was.

  And yet.

  And yet...

  She never got wet over other women.

  Not even 'B' got her creaming.

  She never used toys.

  Always the real thing.

  Only what was the real thing anyway?

  She wasn't sure anymore, but still got wet over dick; not pussy.

  Something 'B' had said came to mind.

   'Guess now who holds thee?

    Death, I said.

    But then the silver answer rang,

     Not Death, but Love.'

   from Sonnets from the Portuguese (1845-6)

    by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

     one

   I thought once how Theocritus had sung

   Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,

   Who each one in a gracious hand appears

   To bear a gift for mortals, old or young;

   And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,

   I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,

   The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,

   Those of my own life, who by turns had flung

   A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware,

  So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move

  Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair,

  And a voice said in mastery while I strove,

  Guess now who holds thee? - Death I said. But, there

  The silver answer rang: Not Death, but Love.

   May the Goddess watch over you, and those you love, 

   kerk hiraeth