Simple Conversations...

Sarah awakened and rubbed her eyes. Talk about a strange dream! The Goblin King coming back and tucking her daughter in. She shook her head and laughed at the thought. She stumbled into the kitchen shielding the bright sunlight that entered the windows from her eyes.

"Good morning Sarah. Sleep well?" That voice. She dropped her hand away from her eyes and stared wide eyed at the scene before her. The Goblin King was leaning against her kitchen counter. Dressed completely in black, one leg crossed over the other. Her daughter was sitting at the kitchen table with an empty bowl of cereal beside her, a coloring book and crayons and was coloring away.

"It wasn't a dream. You really did show up last night." She let out softly.

He smiled at her confusion.

"The Goblin King tucked me in last night mommy. You were sleeping on the couch so he tucked me in and told me a story."

"Did he?" She took a seat at the table across from her daughter. Her daughter nodded furiously.

 "Did you sleep well mommy?"

"Very well sweetie. Better then I have in years."

"I knew he could help! I just knew it!" Aryanna chanted happily. Sarah smiled lazily at her daughter and looked up at Jareth who was still leaning against the counter.

"You even gave her breakfast." She commented.

Jareth nodded and let an amused smile play across his lips. "She was hungry and wanted to wake you but I wouldn't allow it. It wasn't too difficult to get the box from the cupboard , put the cereal in a bowl and fill it with milk. I allowed her to color so that she would keep quiet and not disturb you."

"Thank you. Oh what time is it?" She glanced up at the clock on the oven. "Go get dressed sweetie. The bus will be here in 20 minutes. Go brush your teeth too."

"Aw do I have to go to school? Can't I stay home and hang out with you and the Goblin King?"

'No, you're going to school. Maybe if you have a good day at school he will still be here when you come home."

"Really?"

"Of course." Jareth told her. "But you must have a good day at school."

"Oh I will, I will!" She rushed quickly from the table and up the stairs. She dressed and brushed her teeth and Sarah styled her hair. She grabbed her coat and backpack and Jareth stood in the bay window watching Sarah bring her out to the bus.

She reentered the house and closed the front door behind her. "She is such a wonderful little child. Too bad that more like her did not enter my Labyrinth."

"Don't get any ideas." Sarah pointed an accusing finger at him and he laughed.

"I wouldn't dare. Breakfast?"

She shook her head. "No I'm fine. I usually don't eat breakfast."

"Well you should. You are entirely too thin."

"No really I'm fine. I'll have something later." She entered the kitchen and put Aryanna's dirty cereal bowl and spoon into the sink and filled the bowl with water. She turned around to see Jareth finish clearing the coloring book and crayons, returning them to the small table beneath the kitchen phone. She gave him a lazy smile and he returned it. He looked so handsome when he smiled. Then she thought about her own appearance. She must look like hell! "I'm going to take a shower and make myself a little more presentable."

 He nodded and she left the kitchen hardly believing what had happened over the course of last night and this morning. Had the Goblin King, Jareth really returned after all this time? Was he here because her daughter had summoned him to help her?

 She returned a half hour later to find him sitting at the kitchen table, glancing at everything in the room. She took a seat beside him, pulling one sock onto her foot. She regarded him nervously. "Umm, thanks for last night. I probably scared you with how I was acting. Not what you remember I'm sure." "No you didn't scare me, just worried me. This is all my fault."

"Jareth please, how could any of this be YOUR fault? Did you tell my fianc‚ to leave me? Did you tell my co workers to make my life a miserable hell? Did you make my car break down 3 times a week? No you didn't."

"But I should have checked in on you. I should have stopped you from falling so far."

She shook her head. "That wasn't your responsibility. I was a big girl who could take care of herself. As far as I knew, you hated me. Why would you come help me?"

"I never hated you Sarah. I was angry with you for a long time, but I never hated you."

"You should have." She said pulling the other sock onto her foot. " I was a spoiled little bitch to you."

"Don't say such things. You merely played out your part. I should have expected no less."

"Did you mean what you told Ary last night?" She took a deep breath lowering her feet to the floor. "Did you love me back then?"

Jareth froze and she cursed herself. He was regressing back to the arrogant Goblin King right before her eyes.

"It's ok, you don't have to answer that. I had no right to ask you."

"How do you know what I told Ary?"

"I heard you from in the hall. I woke up and went to check on her and I found you telling her a bedtime story."

"How do you know it was about us?"

"Lucky guess. Too many coincidences in that story. It's ok, you don't have to answer me."

"I never stopped loving you from the moment love took a hold of me." He whispered softly.

Sarah's jaw dropped. "So you did love me? That whole speech before I defeated you wasn't part of the game was it?" He shook his head sadly. "Oh god." One hand flew up to cover her mouth. "I'm so sorry! There you were trying to tell me you loved me and I practically spit in your face."

"It's all right. I didn't exactly go about things the right way and you were too young to understand." He leaned closer to her, lowering his voice as he spoke. "Did you love me back then as Ary believes you did?"

"She is a perceptive little brat." She allowed.

"I'll take that as a yes?" he said cocking his head to one side. She nodded. He couldn't believe how she had matured over the years. She had not yelled at him once, had not even tried to claim that things had been unfair. She didn't claim to hate him. As he waited for her to answer him, he realized that he had fallen in love with her all over again.

"I did for a while, but then...then I grew up. I graduated high school, went to college, met Adam. Then I fell in love with him. Biggest mistake of my life." She said smoothing her fingers over the polyurethane coating on the wood table.

"Hardly. He gave you a beautiful and intelligent child."

"Yeah he did. But he didn't want anything to do with her, the bastard. He was gone the minute he found out that I was pregnant. He left me a pathetic note saying he wasn't ready for commitment to me or a child. I never heard from him again."

"I'm sorry." His voice was full of genuine sympathy.

"Don't be. He's not even worth thinking about." She swatted blindly at the air.

"So you've been alone all this time? Raising Ary all by yourself?" She nodded and traced her fingers along a knot in the wood of the table.

"My father and stepmother helped whenever they could. But then they passed away 3 years ago. My brother and his girlfriend take her every other weekend. So I have had a little help, but I've raised her mostly alone."

 "You did a wonderful job and you should be proud of yourself. She is a wonderful little girl who loves her mother very much."

"Thank you. I forget what compliments are sometimes since I never receive them."

"You deserve many." He reached for her, and a gloved hand buried itself into her damp hair. She closed her eyes and savored the touch. It had been so long since anyone had given her any attention. She didn't date after Adam. No one wanted to date a woman with a baby anyway. It should have felt so very strange to have the Goblin King in her kitchen, dressed in his strange clothing, allowing him to caress her face. But it wasn't strange. Not in the slightest. He grew a little bolder with his touches, his fingers moving along her neck and her collar bone. She let her head fall back, eyes still closed.

Somehow they were both standing, though neither of them remembered getting up from their chairs. Jareth reached for her pulling her into his arms and just held her. She didn't cry but merely held onto him as if her life depended on it. Her fingers wrapped around the silk ruffles of his collar. She could feel the warmth of his chest against her cheek. The warmth of his body that was pressed against hers. It made her realize that he was real and he always had been real.

He stood and held her. He would not do anything more. She was still hurting and he refused to take advantage of her. She wasn't a one night stand, or a fling. He was here to help her and he would...

This can't be real...

Sarah regained her composure quickly, much to Jareth's dismay. She backed away from him and he felt his heart sink.

"I.." She started but she couldn't think of anything to say. She was beginning to come to her senses, realizing that she had been in Jareth's arms. Jareth the Goblin King. Now that certainly didn't make sense.

He didn't say anything to her, just looked at her with sorrow filled eyes. Why was she suddenly pulling away from him? Things had been going so smoothly...

"I have to be dreaming.. this isn't real. It's too perfect, too weird. It's an illusion." She said, refusing to look at him. "I'm still in the rocking chair. That's what's real, this... this isn't." She shook her head, trying to convince herself.

Jareth let out a deep sigh.

"The Goblin King doesn't show up in my living room holding my little girl's hand and he certainly doesn't tuck her into bed, tell her a story and give her breakfast the following morning. I'm dreaming...I'm...definitely...dreaming."

"You're not dreaming." He said softly.

"Yes..I am!" Her voice rose in volume and for the first time since Jareth had been in her presence he sensed some of the old Sarah returning. "The Goblin King I know would never do those things."

"Can you be so sure?" He stepped closer to her and she could feel the warmth of his breath on her cheek.

"YES! He was cold and sinister, manipulative, arrogant. He would never do these things."

"People change Sarah. Haven't you, yourself changed from what you once were? You don't appear to be the na‹ve, spoiled but also adventurous teenager that I remember, which is of course normal. As you said, you grew up and in the process you changed and matured. And when trouble came your way and it became too much of a burden you changed again. Hiding your spirit, your invincible will somewhere deep within you. So is it so hard to believe that I have changed as well? I may appear to be arrogant and cold sometimes but that is not all that I am. I have changed and it was you who brought that change to me.."

"No..he couldn't change, it's not possible."

"Why are you talking about me as if I was not here?" The first real anger in his voice since he had entered this house.

"You're not! This isn't real!" She gestured to everything and backed away from him, bumping into the kitchen wall. She buried her face into her hands.

Jareth realized this was a crucial point. He had to make her believe that everything happening was real, that he was real. She was repressing her emotions, trying to hide within the hole she had dug for herself. The hole that she escaped to when she had not been able to deal with things over the last several years. He would find that hole and he would fill it with as much dirt as he could. He'd build a mountain over it. He wouldn't let her escape into it anymore.

"Look at me Sarah. Please." When she didn't respond, he gently pried her hands from her face. She was not crying but she looked helplessly lost. He took one hand and put it against his chest. She could feel the rythmic beating of his heart beneath her palm. "What do you feel Sarah?...tell me."

She remained silent for a moment, her hand lingering over the warm pale flesh.

"What do you feel?" he asked again. His voice was painfully soft, his breath sweet and warm on her face.

 "I feel..a heartbeat." She said softly.

He reached for her hand and brought it slowly to his lips, placing light kisses on the skin.

"I'm real Sarah. I always have been and I always will be and I am here to help you. I'm not leaving until I accomplish my task. There is a little girl who summoned me here to help her mother and that is exactly what I intend to do. I will not let her down."

She surprised him when she pulled her hand from his and reached up gently touching his hair. The blond hair was smooth and silky and so very soft. Like a child's fine hair. He studied her with his eyes, watching her. Her gaze didn't meet his, she was watching her fingers entwine in his hair. He didn't move, and if he could have, he would have stopped breathing. He would let her set the pace to whatever the future had in store. He had already decided that he would not push his feelings on her. He wasn't here to reclaim her or try to wisk her away to his castle. This wasn't revenge and it wasn't salvation.

He would help her and her daughter survive and try to restore happiness in her life. If love was found along the way, then so be it, but if it wasn't, then that's the way things went. He would be content with the gift that a little girl had given him. For he was given time, to spend with the woman he loved and thought he would never see again.