All I Really Want 
}}}  Lyrics by Alanis Morissette 
Story by Imajiru
imajiru@mindspring.com
imajiru@unicorn-x.net



}}}  Do I stress you out
}}}  My sweater is on backwards and inside out
}}}  And you say how appropriate
}}}  I don't want to dissect everything today
}}}  I don't mean to pick you apart you see
}}}  But I can't help it 


"That's an interesting look," Nick said lightly, from 
behind her.  "You get dressed in the dark today?" 

She had grown used to his silent entrances, so she didn't 
jump in startlement -- but today, he was the last person 
she wanted to see; and his attempt to dismiss their 
difficulties with the use of his dubious charm was more 
then she could endure.  "What do you want, Nick?" she said 
irritably.  "Why are you here?" 

"I thought I'd come by..." and he fumbled, obviously 
struggling to come up with a plausible explanation.  "To 
see how you're doing..." 

//To apologize,// Nat thought, //another half-baked apology 
that you don't really mean.  To smooth things over.  To be 
certain you haven't ruffled my feathers too badly.  After 
all, who *else* are you going to get to find your precious 
cure?// 

And realized all at once that she'd spoken her thoughts 
aloud, by the wide-eyed stricken look on his face. 

"Oh, don't," she said, with annoyance.  "Don't bother, eh?  
Just *don't*.  We both know that it really doesn't matter." 

"Natalie..."  His voice was soft, as gentle as it had been 
on that night when he'd told her how he felt... that *one* 
night; a fluke, it seemed, considering his behavior 
since... 

"Get out, Nick," she snarled at him.  "Go tell it to 
*Janette*." 

At least he had the decency to look guilty. 

"Nat," he began, "you don't understand..." 

"No, *you* don't understand.  I've had enough, Nick."  She 
sighed, and turned away. 

And since she knew he wouldn't leave, she walked out of the 
lab; she'd thought that she was heading for the sanctuary 
of the ladies' room, but before she quite realized what was 
happening, Natalie found herself walking out of the 
building, unlocking her car door... 

"What am I doing?" she asked herself aloud as she slid 
behind the wheel, mystified by her own behavior. 

The answer came to her in an instant's realization.  
//Running away.  I'm running away,// she thought, surprised 
by the vehemence of her own subconscious mind. 

//I'm running away...// 


}}}  There I go jumping before the gunshot has gone off
}}}  Slap me with a splintered ruler
}}}  And it would knock me to the floor if 
}}}  I wasn't there already
}}}  If only I could hunt the hunter 

}}}  And all I really want is some patience
}}}  A way to calm the angry voice
}}}  And all I really want is deliverance 


The first place she went to was Richard's grave, tombstone 
squatting over a falsehood, hiding the truth forever from 
view.  And then it was Cynthia's burial site, dear little 
Cindy, dead at the hands of a maniac... and then her own, 
the spot in the mausoleum that she'd picked out and paid 
for in installments throughout her years of medical school; 
while her contemporaries were selecting their bridal 
registries, she'd appreciated the irony of purchasing her 
own final resting place.  Her parents had been horrified, 
but Nat had thought it entirely appropriate for a coroner-
to-be... 

She ran her fingers over the blank bronze plaque that would 
someday hold her name, and thought of the moment when she'd 
come to know the truth about Nick and his love for her.  
Not the moment when, facing imminent death, she'd begged 
him to bring her over and he'd refused.  That had hurt... 
but the final blow had come later, after Nick had shown up 
at her place, to kill her vampire attacker and trash her 
apartment in the process. 

When she'd awakened to daylight, and realized that she was 
alone. 

When she'd realized that with Nick, she would always be 
alone. 

Then she was grabbing Sidney and her overnight bag, 
ignoring the constant red blink-blink-blink of her 
answering machine.  A bottle of juice and some munchies 
from the fridge, to snack on while she drove; a few changes 
of clothing; a couple of paperback books she'd been meaning 
to read... 

As she was leaving, the phone rang:  once, twice, before 
the machine clicked over.  Her outgoing greeting, and then 
-- "Nat?  It's me...  I think we need to talk..." 

Natalie shook her head, and kept on walking. 

}}}  Do I wear you out
}}}  You must wonder why I'm relentless and all strung out
}}}  I'm consumed by the chill of solitary
}}}  I'm like Estella
}}}  I like to reel it in and then spit it out
}}}  I'm frustrated by your apathy 


Richard's death.  How shellshocked she had been, how 
devastated, how crushed... and Nick had been regretful, but 
had he truly cared?  A mistake had been made and corrected, 
another mistake in what was doubtless a long line of them; 
another dead mortal, what did it mean to him? 

Cynthia's death.  He'd held her as she cried, but with that 
tension in him that meant he was more concerned with his 
own vampiric urges than with her grief.  And later, he'd 
taken her to the cemetary -- and, not knowing how to handle 
her pain, had dealt with it by trying to ignore it. 

Her death -- or so she'd thought.  And he'd turned her away 
-- then prevented her from choosing another.  It didn't 
matter that she'd changed her mind; he would have done the 
same thing if Spark had been honorable and she had been 
compliant.  He wouldn't just have *let* her die, he'd have 
*forced* her to die... 

It occurred to her that she was probably being unfair to 
him; but then, she figured that she'd been fair for long 
enough.  'Poor troubled Nick' and his doomed quest for 
humanity, his endless stream of difficulties and problems 
and needs... what about poor Natalie?  When did it begin to 
matter what she needed and wanted; didn't her pain count, 
too?  When was it *her* turn to wallow in her misery, the 
way he seemed to every other week? 

//Now, I guess,// she discovered ruefully, and nearly 
laughed aloud. 

The sun was rising over the QEW, great golden rays bathing 
her with light, and how long had it been since she'd seen 
the sun?  How long had she been living in Nick's world of 
darkness, simply because he was incapable of living in 
hers? 

//Just how much have I given up for him?// 

The answer frightened Natalie even more than the specter of 
impending death had. 


}}}  And I am frightened by the corrupted ways of this land
}}}  If only I could meet the Maker
}}}  And I am fascinated by the spiritual man
}}}  I am humbled by his humble nature 


She sat on a hillside and watched the sunrise, styrofoam 
take-out cup of coffee in her hand, Sidney curled up in her 
lap: and she wondered if there was a God, and if so, why he 
or she or it had sent Nick in her direction.  What lesson 
was she meant to learn from his presence in her life?  Was 
he her guardian angel, as she'd come to believe over the 
years -- or was he truly the demon creature he'd insisted 
he was at the start? 

Or was he, for all his golden-eyed powers, merely as flawed 
and human as everyone was? 

Natalie felt her heart sink as she realized that it didn't 
matter. 

She loved him, oh, how she loved him, but she couldn't -- 
she just *couldn't* continue this way.  Waiting for his 
dreams of humanity to come true... and even if they did, 
what then?  He would still be the same person he'd always 
been, and with more needs and problems than ever... 

The thought that had been tormenting her more and more 
lately: would she ever have fallen in love with him, if he 
had just been an ordinary mortal man?  Or would she have 
become disgusted with him long ago? 

She closed her eyes against the dawning sunlight, and 
composed a quiet little prayer, to the God she wasn't sure 
would answer:  //Help me to make the right choice.//  For 
she knew, somehow, that her life had abruptly come to a 
turning point -- the course she chose now would be the one 
she followed for quite a while; possibly, for the rest of 
her life. 


}}}  What I wouldn't give to find a soulmate
}}}  Someone else to catch this drift
}}}  And what I wouldn't give to meet a kindred 

}}}  Enough about me, let's talk about you for a minute
}}}  Enough about you, let's talk about life for a while
}}}  The conflicts, the craziness and 
}}}  the sound of pretenses
}}}  Falling all around...all around 


He was attractive: dark hair and eyes, ruggedly handsome, 
wholly unlike a certain blond detective of her 
acquaintance.  Charming, in a completely different way from 
Nick.  She smiled and laughed at all the appropriate 
places, while inside her mind roiled and churned, mulling 
over her options. 

She was tempted to take this stranger -- Bob, was it? -- 
back to her rented motel room for the night, just to prove 
that she could... but that was utterly stupid, given the 
proliferation of diseases these days.  Forget disease: 
since when was she the type of woman to sleep with a 
strange man whose name she could barely retain in her 
memory, just because she couldn't have the one she *really* 
wanted?  That was more than merely stupid: it was 
ridiculous.  Had her almost-relationship with Nick pushed 
her so close to that emotional cliff? 

So after an appropriate interval, Natalie took her leave of 
the man -- not without a certain regret; he *was* 
attractive, and at any other time, she might have given him 
her phone number... this time, though, she demurred at his 
polite request. 

How long *had* it been since she'd been on a nice, normal 
date? 

But until she straightened out her confusion where Nick was 
concerned, she couldn't afford to involve herself with 
anyone else.  Nothing could possibly be more disastrous. 

She had the sense to realize that -- even if she hadn't had 
the sense to keep from falling in love with a vampire. 

Instead, she went to bed alone, Sidney cuddled up behind 
her bent knees, and tried to remember what it had been like 
to fall asleep with a man's arms around her.  Tried for the 
umpteenth time to imagine falling asleep with Nick's arms 
around her.  

Hard to visualize, especially since she wasn't quite sure 
whether she wanted to kiss him, or wring his neck. 

He had taken over her whole life.  Talking with Bob -- 
she'd realized how much of her existence had to be 
censored, kept hidden.  No way to change that, short of 
packing up and relocating vampire-style and trying to ever 
forget she'd known Nick... 

She'd had her chance to forget Nick; she could have let the 
hypnosis sink in, instead of fighting it.  She'd had her 
chance to turn her back and walk away.  Several chances, in 
fact. 

And she hadn't been able to do it then, and there was no 
way she could bring herself to do it now. 

After an hour and a half of tossing and turning, Natalie 
made her choice.  And prayed that it was the right one, for 
it was the only one she could possibly make. 


}}}  Why are you so petrified of silence
}}}  Here can you handle this? 


Broad daylight, so he had to be there; no sign of him 
downstairs, so he had to be in the bedroom, asleep... 

As she tiptoed upstairs, she had the horrid premonition 
that she would find Janette curled up beside him -- but no, 
he was in bed alone, limbs sprawling carelessly, little-boy 
innocent in his slumber. 

Natalie closed the door behind herself, and soundlessly 
drew off her coat -- and then her shirt, and her 
sweatpants; and when there was nothing left to remove, she 
slid under the satin sheets beside him and began working on 
his pajamas. 

She was halfway down the buttons of his shirt when he 
awoke, eyes blinking open and focusing on her with a very 
human blurriness.  "Nat!"  Pure unbridled joy his first 
reaction, at the sight of her; then, "What are you 
*doing*?" 

"I've had enough of this," Natalie announced calmly, not 
allowing her fingers to falter.  "A couple months ago, you 
told me that you loved me.  Did you mean it?" 

"Nat... of course I meant it, but... you *know* how 
dangerous this is...!"  He caught at her hands, held them 
in his own. 

She wrenched them away -- he would have had to hurt her, in 
order to maintain his grip, and clearly he didn't want to 
injure her.  Or maybe he just really didn't want to stop 
her at all...  "I love you, Nick," she said.  "And I'm not 
willing to spend the rest of my life waiting to see whether 
it'll ever be possible for us to love each other properly.  
I can't go on this way any longer.  Either I'm going to be 
with you, or I'm going to leave you... and I can't leave 
you." 

"I could leave you," Nick said, very quietly. 

"No," Natalie said gravely, "you can't." 

He was silent for a moment.  "No, I guess I really can't," 
and the emotion in his face floored her: someday, he 
*would* have to leave her, to go on to a new life somewhere 
else, and in that instant, Natalie glimpsed the agony that 
the flight would cause him. 

//It's 'poor troubled Nick' time again,// she thought, and 
smiled, for the thought no longer bothered her. 

"I want to be with you," she told him.  "Either it works, 
or it doesn't." 

"If it doesn't 'work'," he said sharply, "you'll die." 

"We all die sometime," Nat said lightly.  "Well, most of 
us."  She pried the last button free, ran her hand along 
Nick's bare chest and had the satisfaction of feeling him 
quiver.  Although from his body's involuntary reactions, it 
had been clear for some time that the last thing he wanted 
was to dissuade her from her intentions... 

"Nat, you don't know what you're doing to me..." 

"You don't know what you're doing to *me*," she pointed 
out.  "Nick, I have to know.  If this is ever going to work 
between us, I have to know..." 

His hands were gliding across her bare skin, caressing her 
with a kind of dazed wonderment; but Nick being Nick, he 
still resisted.  "Don't make me do this!" 

"*Make* you do this?"  She stared at him.  "I have no 
intentions of forcing you into anything.  Say the word, 
tell me to leave, and I'll go."  //And you'll never see me 
again,// she thought, for that was part of the decision 
she'd made -- but that was not for him to know.  He had to 
make his own choice, free from ultimatums. 

He drew a deep, shaky breath, tried to speak -- but 
instead, his arms tightened around her, and he pulled her 
into a deep and lengthy kiss. 

//That's about what I thought you'd do,// she thought 
fondly, before surrendering to the stuff that her dreams 
had been made of for the last three years... 


}}}  Did you think about your bills, your ex, 
}}}  your deadlines
}}}  Or when you think you're gonna die
}}}  Or did you long for the next distraction
}}}  And all I need now is intellectual intercourse
}}}  A soul to dig the hole much deeper
}}}  And I have no concept of time other than it is flying
}}}  If only I could kill the killer 


She brushed her hair idly, looking at her reflection in the 
mirror.  "You need practice," she said to her companion. 

Nick tugged a cork out of a winebottle -- his third in the 
past hour.  Under the circumstances, she wasn't inclined to 
protest.  "I was expending most of my energy trying to keep 
from killing you," he said mildly, unoffended. 

"I know.  And you did a very good job of it; look, I'm 
still breathing." 

"I noticed," he said, watching her chest rise and fall in 
rhythm with her respiration; she hadn't dressed yet, and he 
seemed to be enjoying the sight. 

"I'll help you practice," said Natalie airily, looking 
forward to the prospect; even 'unpracticed', the experience 
had more than lived up to her expectations.  This was Nick, 
after all, and she loved him; he would have had to be truly 
awful to disillusion her completely. 

"Nat...!  You have no idea how *difficult* it was... and 
you want me to run that risk again?" 

"Are you honestly going to tell me that you don't *want* 
to?" she countered. 

He sighed.  "I'm afraid, Nat.  I'm afraid for you..." 

"Be more afraid for yourself, and what I'm going to do to 
you if you say no.  Nick, really, you're such a tease..." 

Merry laughter then, banishing the worry etched into his 
face.  "All right," he conceded.  "I suppose, if I could 
manage to control myself once..." 

"Good boy," said Nat approvingly. 

"But I'm telling you right now," he went on, voice 
sobering, "you're driving me to drink," and regarded the 
rapidly-emptying flask in his hand. 

"Cow?" she asked. 

He made a sour face.  "Moo," he said grimly, and Nat 
giggled. 

"You're a good boy," she said again, abandoning the 
hairbrush to crawl over to his side of the bed; she stroked 
his hair, still damp from the shower, and idly curled a wet 
ringlet around her finger.  "You try so hard to be good..." 

"I never wanted to hurt you," Nick said, with sudden 
earnestness.  "I"d rather die than hurt you, don't you know 
that?" 

"I know that," Natalie agreed, and wondered if she'd really 
made the right choice. 

So now they were sleeping together, and that was a good 
thing.  A very good thing, despite all joking wisecracks to 
the contrary.  But he was still Nick, and she was still 
Nat, and all the things that had come between them in the 
past would continue to do so.  She hadn't found any panacea 
for her problems and heartache, only a temporary quick-fix 
solution. 

Eventually, the pain would begin anew... 

But if she had left him, left Toronto and all her life 
behind as she'd been seriously tempted to do, she would 
always have wondered about what might have been... 

Now, for better or worse, she would know. 

She cuddled close to Nick, and he held her tightly, and she 
could almost read his mind: knew he was thinking along the 
same lines she was. 

They wanted, needed, loved each other; but was that going 
to be enough? 


}}}  All I really want is some peace man
}}}  A place to find a common ground
}}}  And all I really want is a wavelength
}}}  All I really want is some comfort
}}}  A way to get my hands untied
}}}  And all I really want is some justice... 


-- end -- 


}}} "All I Really Want", from "Jagged Little Pill" by 
Alanis 
Morissette.  It's a really good album; go out and buy it, 
right now! 

-------

This story did NOT go where I expected it to go... 

....so here's an alternate ending... 


All I Really Want (Alternate Ending)
}}}  Lyrics by Alanis Morissette 
Story by Imajiru 


}}}  Why are you so petrified of silence
}}}  Here can you handle this? 


"Nat!  You're back...!"  Such relief in his voice; it broke 
her heart. 

She didn't stop to acknowledge him; it took a moment before 
he noticed what she was doing.  "Nat?"  And she could feel 
him coming closer, moving across what had once been her 
office. 

"I'm leaving," she said shortly.  "The files from the most 
recent cases are stacked up on my desk; you can discuss 
them with my successor." 

"The hell with the *cases*!"  He grabbed her wrist, held it 
tightly.  "What do you mean, leaving?  Where are you 
going?" 

"Away, Nick.  Away from Toronto.  Away from you."  Natalie 
looked down at her wrist.  "You're hurting me," she said 
quietly. 

"I'm sorry."  He let go, and if a vampire could blush, he 
would have been. 

"That's the whole problem, y'know," she continued, almost 
casually.  "You're always hurting me, and you're always 
sorry, and it never stops you from hurting me again.  Like 
that thing with Janette..." 

"Nat, you don't understand!  There are times..."  Now he 
*was* blushing, vampirism be damned.  "Times I can't hold 
back any longer," he said, very softly.  "When I need to 
turn to... someone..." 

"But not me," Natalie said levelly. 

"You would *die* of it, Nat!  I thought you understood."  
She recognized the tone of tired disappointment in his 
voice; he sounded the same way he had on the night she'd 
asked him to bring her over.  'You mean you don't?'  How 
hurt he had been, at what he'd undoubtedly perceived as her 
betrayal.  And how completely he had misinterpreted her. 

"You're the one who doesn't understand, Nick."  She sighed.  
"I'm in love with you; you know that." 

"Nat, I..." 

"*Don't* say it," she overrode him, "don't say anything."  
And looked up into his eyes, for what might be the last 
time.  "I can't spend my whole life waiting for something 
that might never happen.  And I can't get on with my life 
as long as I'm around you." 

"You *can't* leave!  What about a cure, what about... what 
about me, Nat?"  He looked so lost and forlorn that she 
almost changed her mind. 

Almost.  "You've survived eight centuries without me," she 
reminded him.  "You'd have to survive without me someday, 
in any case."  //It's okay if I die in a meteor crash, but 
not if I leave you?!// a part of her mind screamed, but she 
ignored it.  "Look, Nick... I can't discuss this with you 
now.  Go home, all right?  I'll call you when I'm done 
here.  Okay?" 

He hesitated, clearly not liking it.  "You've got to give 
me a chance," he pleaded.  "Promise me you won't leave 
until we've had a chance to talk..." 

"Nick..." 

"Promise me!" he insisted, and she could see she'd have no 
peace until she relented. 

"All right, Nick; I promise."  She reached out and hugged 
him swiftly, letting herself sink once more into his 
strength: luxuriating in the feeling, memorizing it. 

-------

When she was finished packing her things, she went to her 
apartment and repeated the procedure... and then, for the 
first and only time, she deliberately broke a promise to 
Nick: she left Toronto, and she didn't look back. 


}}}  Did you think about your bills, your ex, 
}}}  your deadlines
}}}  Or when you think you're gonna die
}}}  Or did you long for the next distraction 


Natalie hadn't been to New York City in a long while, and 
as always, it fascinated and repelled her at once.  Tall 
diamond skyscrapers towering over filth-encrusted streets, 
and the people... she played tourist, visiting the World 
Trade Center and the Empire State Building and riding the 
ferry to the Statue of Liberty, letting the sharp tang of 
the salty air whip through her curls. 

It was purest chance that took her down 42nd Street, past 
Hotaling's Newsstand, where the out-of-town papers were 
sold, and purest nostalgia that made her buy a copy of the 
Toronto Star.  She riffled through it absently, not 
allowing herself to be too caught up in the reminiscences 
it inevitably brought... until she came to the article, 
barely a footnote, that told her of the repercussions of 
her actions. 

To the officials, Detective Nicholas Knight was officially 
missing, no evidence of foul play, just a bizarre 
disappearance -- but the passing mention of a pile of ash 
on the rooftop of his loft told Natalie all she needed to 
know. 

She stood stock-still in the middle of Times Square, 
staring at the bland newsprint, at the matter-of-fact way 
in which it presented the horror. 

And then she began to tremble. 

And then she began to scream. 


}}}  And all I need now is intellectual intercourse
}}}  A soul to dig the hole much deeper
}}}  And I have no concept of time other than it is flying
}}}  If only I could kill the killer 


"How are you feeling today, Natalie?" 

She managed a wan smile.  "Better," she said. 

"Would you like to tell me more about your friend the 
vampire?" 

"Sure," Natalie said, almost gleefully.  It was a relief, 
after the years of secrecy, to finally be able to talk 
about what she'd been through.  Never mind that they didn't 
believe her; never mind that they thought it was all some 
strange psychosis.  For the first time, she had the 
opportunity to *tell* someone, all of it, and she was 
taking full advantage of that boon. 

It was really a pretty nice place.  Upstate New York, 
lovely countryside.  The food was good, the rooms nicely 
furnished and well-maintained -- and they only locked the 
doors of her cottage at night, since Natalie was considered 
to be one of the 'well-behaved' patients.  Most of the day, 
she was free to wander the grounds, sit under a tree with a 
book from the small library, watch television in the lounge 
-- between her sessions, anyway. 

And at night, she could look out of her small barred 
window, gaze up at the stars, and remember what it had been 
like to share the nights with Nick. 

How foolish she had been.  She had assumed that, being 
immortal, he would go on forever; she had assumed that he 
would simply pick up and get on with his life once she was 
gone.  She'd been wrong, both times.  And now, his death -- 
and the fact that she had directly caused it -- was more 
than she could bear. 

She still tended to burst into tears for no apparent 
reason, despite the steadily-increasing doses of 
medication. 

She'd made the wrong choice; she knew that now.  And there 
was no way she could go back and fix it, make it right... 

She'd promised to help Nick find his long-lost mortality... 
and so she had, in the cruelest way possible. And no matter 
what she did, no matter what the doctors did, the pain 
never, ever stopped. 

But for now, she was content.  For the next fifty-minute 
hour, she could talk about Nick; and by doing so, bring him 
a little closer.  She didn't have the clarity of vampire 
memory; already, certain details were becoming vague.  And 
she didn't want to forget *anything* about Nick, not ever. 

Her memories of him were the only immortality she had left, 
now. 

Tears trickling slowly down her face in contrast to her 
faint smile, Natalie began to tell the psychiatrist about 
Valentine's Day, and how Nick had told her that he loved 
her. 

}}}  All I really want is some peace man
}}}  A place to find a common ground
}}}  And all I really want is a wavelength
}}}  All I really want is some comfort
}}}  A way to get my hands untied
}}}  And all I really want is some justice... 


-- end --