A/N: These are short drabbles that got suggested to me on Tumblr... thanks to the anon who told me to write them. The link to the prompts is here: post/86021694055/send-a-number-or-2-and-a-pairing-and-ill-try | So these are shorter than my usual fics, but I hope you enjoy them regardless.

14: First Kiss

Will touched two fingers to his lips again… it still couldn't mimic the feeling of that kiss…

His first kiss.

Being around the same two girls for his whole life, he never thought about kissing anyone. He knew Jenny and Alyss so well that he never considered kissing them, but now that Alyss's lips had been against his, he couldn't think about anything else.

"Your vacation is up," said his mentor, suddenly. Will snapped out of his thoughts. "Time to come back down to Earth, now."

Will stared sheepishly at the path in front of him. They should be reaching the cabin soon, he realized, and meanwhile he was still caught up in what had happened back at Araluen. He muttered an apology to Halt, who barely acknowledged it with a grunt.

That didn't keep him from thinking about it later, of course. Will laid wide awake that night, replaying that scene in his head… He just couldn't stop thinking about it.

Will turned over and buried his face in his pillow. He felt like kind of an idiot. It was just one kiss, and it probably didn't mean anything. People kissed all the time. He wondered… had it been her first kiss, too?

Miles and miles away, Alyss took a big sigh. She pulled up the sheets to her head and squeezed her eyes shut.

It's not that she regretted what she did… in fact, it was the exact opposite. She wondered, had it been Will's first kiss, too?

People kissed all the time, and a great guy like Will must've had a ton of girls fall in love with him before. He probably assumed it was a friendly kiss, she thought. And I guess that's a good thing. It won't mess up our friendship, next time we meet.

It was probably a friendly kiss, Will decided, with a curt nod. He paused. Even with that figured out, he didn't feel any more at rest than he had before. But, still… he thought, is it as important to her as it is to me?

Alyss sighed again, and turned over. She closed her eyes, because she knew she had to try and get some sleep that night. Everything would sort itself out, she figured, and she pressed two fingers to her lips.

That night, while she and Will fell asleep to the thoughts of each other, she made a promise. She promised herself that her first kiss wouldn't be her last with Will.

Years passed, but she never forgot that promise. And she never gave up on it.

49: Coming Home

Whenever Will was out somewhere, taking care of official Ranger business, or even going to a Gathering, he always looked forward to coming back to his cabin. He loved his cabin, not because of the design itself, but because of the feeling it gave him. It felt like home… and he'd never had a home.

Not really. When he was growing up, he considered the Ward his home, but that was a place that several kids considered their home. He wanted something special to him. Something that no one else could have but him… and he thought that that his cabin was it…

But a home was supposed fill a hole in your heart. And his cabin just didn't do that.

After all this time, Will still needed a home.

But wait, he thought to himself, one day, as he was riding back from a Gathering. I did have a home.

For the first time in way too long, he smiled. He caught a wisp of a memory, like a sweet smell just barely reaching his nose. He trusted Tug to guide him through the forest and closed his eyes.

Will and Alyss happened to be in Araluen at the same time, so they spent the time they had to themselves with each other, wandering around the town. Eventually they found a street where the merchants sold their wares… and they strolled around, pointing out food that looked good and occasionally buying a thing or two.

Alyss used the hand that wasn't holding Will's to point over to one side. "Oh, that looks good," she said. On the stand she was looking at, there was a beautiful chocolate cake on display for everyone to lust over.

Will chuckled. Alyss had always had a secret sweet tooth. "Want to get a piece?" he asked.

"No, it's alright," she said. "Let's save our money for something else."

"Okay." The truth was, Will didn't plan on buying anything big. He didn't come here to look at the clothes and desserts.

He squeezed her hand, suddenly, and turned his head sideways to look at her. She knew exactly where to look and where his eyes were. She'd done it so many times, now it was muscle memory. "I love you," he told her. But he was only scratching the surface of his feelings for her. They ran so much deeper than 'I love you'.

A smile spread across Alyss's face. Those words made her heart swell every time she heard them, no matter where she was, or how she felt. "I love you too," she said. "And I love being here with you… It reminds me of when we were kids."

"I don't care where we are. I just want to be with you."

Alyss was home, Will realized, in the present.

His grin was reaching all across his face, now, and a warm feeling spread through his chest, filling every cell and making him wish it would never go away… And then he saw a tear fall into Tug's mane. Then another. Before he knew it, a ton of tears were streaming down Will's face, and he couldn't stop them, no matter how hard he tried.

"I don't care where I am…" Will sobbed. "I just want to be with you again."

He was right…

Because now that Alyss was gone, he didn't have a home.