who: billy and maddie
where: back yard, osbourne residence
when: late morning

It had not been a good morning for the dreamwalker. In fact, that might be a contestant for understatement of the year. To say that the dreamwalker didn't do well when Maddie wasn't around was another massive understatement and the two stemmed from exactly the same source - the fact that when he'd called her that morning, she hadn't come, which meant that something was really Wrong. She had to come, his call forced her to wherever he was, whether she liked it or not. There were only so many reasons that Billy could think of why she hadn't come and none of them were good. Not a single one and he felt like he'd shut down.

Oz had been as much help as possible, but there was only so much the werewolf could do. The morning had passed for Billy in an empty, hollow blur filled with the occasional spike of panic. Currently, though, he was sitting on the back steps, staring at the ground between his feet. He didn't know how long he'd been there. he didn't remember sitting down. Everything was a mess.

Madigan Dante was having a very trying day so far. Why? Because she'd been out pretty goddamn far last night. The nights previous had been quiet, but she never trusted vampires. They were awful little blighters, and she detested them intensely. This lot wasn't any different, and all it did was bring up bad memories for her. So, with the living back at the house, she'd gone scouting, just to make sure there weren't any hangin out in the woods, just waiting to play games. And unfortunately...quite abruptly she'd been booted out of the spirit world. It was jarring, to put it ridiculously mildly.

So! One second she was walking along as a ghost, fine and dandy, the next she was pulled, a rough, hard process that wasn't in the slightest bit pleasant. A scream had ripped out, not that anyone was around to hear it. She'd been left curled on her side on the forest floor for a good half hour after that, simply dealing with the physical aftereffects of having been resurrected. Again. God. That could really only mean one thing. Her grandbaby...

After she'd gotten over the initial insane shock of it, she'd gotten up, and she'd looked around, not even sure which direction she'd come from anymore. It wasn't like ghosts left tracks, now was it? So she'd had to wander. And it felt like she wandered for hours--and that would be because she had. Eventually, she found the lake shore, and followed that, checking paths back up since she knew the wolf's property had one of those, and finally--she was walking up that path and she saw the house. She was exhausted, looked vaguely like hell, and she was freezing. She supposed techincally she was in shock, though she didn't really think she had time for that. She stopped when she noticed the figure on the back steps.

He sat leaning forward on the top step, his feet on a lower tread, his elbows resting on his knees, his head in his hands as he stared downwards, seeing but not seeing the specks of dirt that were scattered over the stairs beneath him, not really caring. He heard the footsteps in the same way that he'd heard the birds flying around, the wind in the trees - distant, unreal, happening far away to someone else. His world was silent, a bubble, disconnected from everything. He didn't look up - why would he? The only person he wanted to see right now was a ghost, and ghosts didn't have footsteps.

She watched him for a good few minutes, before she started forward. It was a few slow steps at first. Then a little faster, until she was running full tilt towards him, up the annoyingly large back yard, until she was on him, one foot hitting the stairs below him before she practically barreled into him, arms going around him in a tight, clinging sort of embrace, and she didn't even care if she hit the steps a bit too hard, or that balance was for people who didn't do this sort of thing, what with her knocking them both over.

Billy was thrown back by the force of the tackle, not seeing it coming, not reacting particularly quickly because of that, until somewhere between her hitting him and him landing hard on the porch floor, he realised who it was and his arms came up and round and he opened his mouth to speak just as the air left his lungs in a rush as he landed.

She didn't do a whole lot in those first few seconds but cling. Maddie wasn't overly given to random acts of sentimentality, but every once in a while she went and proved she did in fact, have a heart. It wasn't even made of stone. While she probably should say something, she didn't, she just clinged, and blinked hard a couple of times. Then there came kisses. Little ones, all over his face, shoulder, the side of his neck, pretty much any part of him in proper range? It got one.

She was here, she was here and she was manifested and Billy's internal clock started ticking, unconsciously already counting down the time until she disappeared again. He wanted to know where the hell she'd been, but that could wait until she was once again incorporeal. There was a time and a place, after all - and in these few minutes, talking as not the order of the day as he buried his hands into her hair and shifted her head so that he could stop the little kisses and kiss her properly and deeply.

She kissed him back, moving only to climb onto his lap, and really give herself over to it for a moment. She'd really need to start explaining soon. But she hadn't ever really been the best when it came to self control around Billy. Hell. It was why they were together, after all. She couldn't actually tell him no in matters of their relationship. She had been worried about him. It had been a constant thread through her mind, vying for attention with the knowledge that her grandbaby had to have died. Probably to the vamps. But with it was her worry for him. Her love, her protected. Being so far from him and not even knowing where she was, knowing she wouldn't even know if he called...had he called? She'd ask. ...later.

He pushed himself upwards so that he was sitting as she climbed into his lap and he pulled her closer, one hand going to her hip, the other still buried in her hair. He'd always had such a thing for her hair, soft and long and thick, he loved to touch it in the few moments that was possible and he did so now, even as he could feel the time ticking down. They didn't have much longer, he knew and he intensified the kiss, not wanting to let her go.

Maddie made a soft sound in the back of her throat, and somewhere in the back of her head, she figured she probably should have started with 'hello, love, guess who got brought back from the dead again last night?' Or something possibly more appropriate than that. But it had never quite been her style. It wasn't what she did. Plus, that would have involved forethought, and when she'd seen him there, she hadn't had that available to her anymore. Her heart was hammering in her chest, and she was having to gasp for breath. She knew the time limit too--and even if she didn't actually have to worry about it right now, it was still ticking down in her mind. Going...going....and she should be gone. But she wasn't. Both hands buried in his hair, she pulled back just a little, half lidded eyes seeking out his. "Billy--love---"

"I know," Billy said, pulling her back to him, resting his forehead against her's for a moment before letting her go. "I know," he whispered again - she had to go, they were pushing it today. Any moment, she'd go and if she didn't move soon, she'd freeze him. He knew this, this was how it worked.

She didn't move, and she moved to brush another kiss across his lips. "Billy...I'm here." she whispered to him. "I'm here. Terry must've..." there was another soft kiss. "I've been lost in th' stupid woods, happened last night sometime...couldn't find my way back straight away..." Another kiss.

The kisses were distracting. And unexpected. And Billy couldn't quite get his head round what she was telling him. He pulled back, away from her, though he kept his hand at her hip and looked at her, frowning in puzzlement. There was no doubting the fact that Madigan Dante had not reverted to her normal ghostly form. He was very aware of the woman in his lap, but... Yeah, there was that 'but' there.

She looked at him, and attempted to behave and not move to kiss him again. "Love, I'm back." she said firmly. Putting it in those terms for him. She drew in a deep breath, and let it out in a rush. "'M here. Terry must've died last night." To spell things out for him.

"Terry?" God - Terry, who he'd only been talking about recently - Terry, the only remaining living Dante. And with the Dante line being a permanent fixture in the world... "You were resurrected?" Billy asked, finally reaching the conclusion, getting the point.

Nodding, she reached for his hands, gathering both of them up and holding them to her chest. "Aye." she answered. "As far as I can tell...been 'round since...sometime mid last night. Did you call for me? Have you been worried?" she asked, looking him over now as if trying to find injury, like it would leap out at her if she took the time now to actually examine the boy as opposed to kissing him like the world was ending.

He nodded. "I called you this morning," he confirmed, recalling with a stab that horrible moment when she didn't reappear, feeling a little foolish now for everything since. But this was the last thing he could ever have expected. Did he admit that? How he'd panicked, the thoughts that had gone through his head, the terror, wondering if he'd lost her again. The fact that he'd started on a downward spiral almost instantly? Did she even know how badly he did without her? He'd told her a few times, but he didn't think that she really appreciated it. Maybe it wasn't fair to place the truth on her - to put her under that kind of pressure. No, that wasn't fair to do to anyone.

She looked worried there, and she pulled him back to her so she could hug him tight again, arms going back around his neck and shoulders. "'M sorry." she said. "I was lost, usually I can just head back, orient on you, but I didn't have any tracks t'follow, and it's not the same when I'm alive." She had a whole different senses set. "Are you okay?" she asked, pulling back once more to look at him, look him in the eyes as if that was going to answer her question.

"Yeah, I'm... I'm fine. Just thrown. I didn't exactly expect this," Billy said, trying to pull himself together and succeeding. He wasn't a guy who stayed thrown for very long - he'd had years of practice of rolling with the punches, after all. He ran his hands up and down her arms, looking her over as if he needed to reassure himself she was still there. "Do we need to find out what happened?" he asked her, quietly. "Make sure it wasn't another spell?" God, that was hard to offer - the last time this had happened, it had been caused by a spell and Maddie's return had only been temporary. Temporary because she had insisted on undoing said spell, causing her own death. It was hard for the dreamwalker to immediately bring up the possibility of that happening again, but he felt it needed to be said.

"We need to find out what happened." Maddie confirmed, and it was just as difficult for her to say it as it was for him. However at the end of the day, Maddie had a code of honor that she stuck by very strictly. So hate it or not, she would look into it, and if the same fucked up mess that had happened the last time was back again--she'd be looking for another Blue Moon to cast her spell to reverse it. Which was a thought she didn't want to be having. It had been hard enogh the first time. "I love you." she said. It was the first thing that popped into her mind as her brain went tripping back into their past. She kissed him again. "I love you." she whispered again, staying close.

She was back, she was really here and she wasn't going anywhere. "I love you too," Billy told her, his voice filled with emotion as he pulled her to him, returning the kiss and deepening it. Today - today was a good day. It was going to surprise the hell out of everyone else, but today was a very good day. The best, he decided.

Maddie stayed where she was for a while, kissing him back, letting it drag out, allowing herself to be there for now. They'd have to be running along inside in a few, and she had a lot of work to put in before the day was through. But for right this very second, she was sitting here with Billy, enjoying the fact that she wasn't disappearing. She was back. She didn't know for how long--she wasn't stupid enough to think this would be a permenant state of being, she was dead, she'd had her time. But she wasn't going to waste any time she did have.