Author's Notes: I wrote this in a weird mood, much the same mood as when I wrote "Even Death". Perhaps that will help to explain it.

Dedication: For Steph, who was promised. For Obi-Norm, who read. For Rob and Sam, who just were.

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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven
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My name was Riley Finn.

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A time to be born
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If I were to be writing a paper for school, I'd say that my life started in a hospital in Des Moines, Iowa on a snowy January night in 1977. I'd write about how it was so cold that my dad's car stalled half a mile from the hospital, and he had to flag down a passing motorist to take them the rest of the way. I relate with amusement how the guy who picked them up was driving a Plymouth Fury, and my mother said there and then that if I was a girl, she would name me Christine in honor of that car.

That would probably have been an even better story had I turned out to be a girl. As it was, I was named after the nasty old tomcat that my mother had had when she was a little girl. That's a part of my story that I prefer to avoid. It isn't as bad as my older sister Gillian, though, who was named after the ferret that my dad had in college.

My parents are a little weird.

The only person in the family who was actually named a person is my baby brother Scott Fitzgerald -- though he has mentioned in that past that he wouldn't have minded being named after a dog or a goldfish or something like that, as long as it resulted in a more normal name.

But, then, that's if I was writing a paper for school. When my life really began, though, wasn't until I was twenty-two.

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And a time to die
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My parents only have two children now. Just as my namesake was run over by a milk truck while having a fight with the cocker spaniel that lived next door, so my own corpse is now six feet beneath the cold ground.

At least I lived up to the legacy of Riley the Cat. I died in a fight with an opponent who was bigger and faster than I was. No milk-truck was there to finish the job, so I was conscious for the last five minutes, when my life was bleeding out. I bled all over everything. Blood on the walls, blood on the floor, blood on Buffy.

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A time to plant
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I joined the army because I believed in two things. The first was that my baby brother would never get good enough grades to get a college scholarship. The second was that I wanted him to get a college education, and that if I got the government to pay for my schooling, then my parents would be able to pay for Scott's.

So I went and served my country. Good grades, clean record, and a firm salute will really get you far. I climbed through the ranks like it was going out of style. I went into the marines, and was a model soldier. I was shipped into special ops, and did even better. When the opportunity to go to Sunnydale for a top secret project called The Initiative came up, I grabbed it with both hands.

It was good for me. While living out that childhood John Wayne dream by protecting people from Hostile Sub-Terrestrials, I was able to work on my master's degree in Psychology under one of the best minds in the field. Special hazard pay allowed me to help my family even more then ever, in addition to being able to buy my first new car. I was in a command position, and I was liked and respected by the men who served under me. There were no moral dilemmas. No twinges of conscience. Just a good life.

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And a time to pluck what is planted
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Then I met a girl, and my life really began.

Turned out that not all those Hostile Sub-Terrestrials were evil. Turned out that one of the best minds in the field of Psychology was playing Frankenstein with disposed body parts and using all of the soldiers as her guinea pigs. Turned out that that special hazard pay was also supposed to pay for my silence and strict obedience even in the face of clear wrong-doing. Turned out that there *were* moral dilemmas, and twinges of conscience. Turned out that there was more than I thought there was to living a good life.

So when that girl stood outside my cell, I followed her away from everything I had known.

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A time to kill
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I was still a soldier -- still someone trained for death. Before, I had trusted in my commanders to make the judgments of demolition. Men with medals, and training, and maps. That trust was broken, but I took the splinters of it and bound it back together. Then I gave it to the girl, who had already been killing for years.

I couldn't kill in planes of black and white anymore. I was drawn into her world of the gray and uncertain, where the villains weren't always clearly defined by black hats and the heroes didn't always wear white.

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And a time to heal
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She wasn't pure or faultless. She wasn't the glittering statue of Joan of Arc --- she was Joan of Arc after the saint had spent a year rallying troops, sleeping in the mud, and watching friends die around her.

But I stood with the small group of people who had gathered around her. Everyone had something broken inside of them --- a pain that she eased. An older man who had served a soulless Council. A red-haired girl whose painful awkwardness had dragged her down for years. A young man who sought escape from the mediocrity that held him down against his will. A demon who was beginning to understand humanity, and another demon who abided by it against his will.

Somehow she was healing us all.

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A time to break down
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My life ended.

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And a time to build up
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And then it began again.

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A time to weep
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I'm not in a hurry to move on. The corpse is in the ground, the tombstone has been raised, but I'm still here. There are other people here, too, so I'll have some company while I wait.

Maybe I should feel guilt that it isn't my family I'm staying by, but I know that they'll be all right. I'm needed here.

She's crying.

I saw the first tears appear through my blurred vision as she cradled my head in her lap and tried to attach a bandage over the ruined remnants of my chest. Even after I couldn't see anymore, I felt them falling onto my face. When I tugged her down so that I could whisper to her one last time, I felt their dampness against my cheek. When she kissed my lips then, ignoring the blood that was smeared everywhere, her tears made small tracks in the dirt and grime. When people made their last respects to my body after the funeral directors had cleaned and arranged it, it made me glad somehow that she leaned down to kiss my forehead, and her tears went with my body to its last rest.

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And a time to laugh
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My last words were rather simple. I couldn't really manage anything more, since my lungs were flooding with blood. I'd said the words before.

Two nights before the last time I drew breathe, I'd said the words to her. We were lying on my bed, and what had begun as an extremely passionate moment ended in giggles when she suddenly began tickling me. We rolled over and over until finally she pinned me down and tickled me until I conceded defeat. Laughter was still echoing around the room as we lay in a ball of tangled limbs and sheets, exhausted and glowing with joy.

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A time to mourn
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I stand by her bed and watch as she twists in her sleep, crying out my name with pain and guilt.

Because she could never say those words back to me. She doesn't know that I knew that --- that I knew that she gave everything to me that she could. Too much was gone to her sacred duty, and too much had gone to the pain of others who had died.

She didn't know that I knew that, and that I stood by her until the end of my days with a clear mind and a full heart.

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And a time to dance.
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That's how I want her to remember the words. When I spoke them in a clear voice from a body that was healthy and perfect. When I looked up at her and said, "I love you."

My name was Riley Finn, and my life began with a girl named Buffy Summers. I loved her with every part of my heart, and when I blocked her from the killing claws of a demon, I closed my eyes and was content.

The End.

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance.
~~Ecclesiastes 3: 1-4

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