Pivotal Chapter 20: Elation

Okay, I had to have a reason that Andrew let Hope leave. I didn’t want anything very bad to happen to him, because, did I mention? I love him! (Not love, love, of course). It just seemed like him tripping and knocking himself out was the perfect solution.

Oh, and interesting side note. I really didn't have enough time to think about chapter names a whole lot. So, this is mostly how they got named: I would explain to Kyle what happened in that chapter, and he would tell me what it should be named, and I would usually type that name in, or a form of that word / phrase. He's pretty good at it, don't you think?

Before I got down to the last week or so, this book had several possible endings.

A few months ago, as I was occasionally thinking about Pivotal II, I had originally planned that in the end, Tammy and Giles would take Hope to Hope’s aunt to see if she wanted to adopt her. Hope’s aunt would then see, through the course of their meeting, how good Tammy was with Hope, then very pointedly say that she thinks Hope would do best being raised by a slayer, and if there wasn’t a slayer that could be found that would be an excellent mother and that wanted her, then she would adopt her. But, I had a few problems with that; a couple I already addressed in the story.

The other, more important reason is my reason why. I kind of like leaving it where the story could have happened. You two could have become slayers, eventually saving the world and all that, then met your husbands, got married, and had kids. You still have your slayer powers, and are still using them in your current job as moms. And I get to be friends with a couple of formidable slayers! Keeping Hope would have just messed with that. Besides. Then I would have had to feel bad for Spike. I mean, he just really fell for Hope in a head-over-heels, I-wanna-be-a-great-dad kind of way. I would have hated to have taken that away from him.

Now, Tammy, if you want to think the story is not about the you you, and is really about another you, and you would like to imagine your other self ending up with Spike and getting to be the mom of Hope anyway, you go girl! It’s there for you if you want it. :-) But I’ll still be imagining it my way.

And, I had thought about Angel asking you to stay, Kellie. In some awkward way where he is trying to convince you that he still really needs your help, without trying to admit that he is really going to miss you.

In the end, I wasn’t really comfortable with either. So, I decided to take a page out of Joss' book and give you a gift of choosing how it ends. If you want to see it as a conclusion, the bulk of evil in the world gone, great! You can go back to college together, where your classes with Tim Minear are waiting. If you aren’t quite done with adventures, you can all stay together in Cleveland for a while, and figure out how to close that hell mouth. I’m sure that will be more than fun. And, if you want to keep going, you could even travel to Europe to help Buffy get rid of the vampires-running-wild-for-a-century problem. You can even see lots and lots of great sights while you are there! Like being on vacation! Whatever you pick, I hope you love it there.