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EPILOGUE -- She Will Be Loved

Author’s Note: Well, this is it! I’m glad I got it done just in time -- I’ll be leaving for school at the end of the week and hoped to wrap up this story. Thank you to every single review -- I’m so happy with the response that I got! Now, with two stories down, I’ll be purely focused on “Game of Love” (BIG Thank You to everyone who’s voting for “Game of Love” on Spuffy Archives!) Hope you like the ending -- happy reading!

The energetic pounding of tennis shoes up the porch of the house on Revelo Drive echoed down the driveway.

“Mia, my love, please don’t run up the stairs. It makes me nervous,” called her mother from the car, hands juggling the tall paper bags overflowing with groceries.

“OK, Mommy,” the blonde haired toddler answered, continuing her sprint.

“Mia!” Her mother scolded.

“But I gotta show Daddy!” the little girl called back, standing on tiptoes to reach the front door handle, flinging the door open wide and bounding inside.

“Daddy! Daddy!” she yelled, failing to use her “indoor” voice.

Her father turned the corner from the kitchen. Curled against his shoulder was a napping six month old in a blue Snoopy sleeper his Uncle Xander had bought him. The baby had a head of wispy blonde curls -- yet more evidence that he was a small replica of his daddy. The little girl’s father crouched down in front of her, “Yes, poppet?” He lovingly brushed some unruly bangs from her green eyes.

“Look what I made for you!” The four year old thrust a piece of flimsy paper at her father. On it was a series of mixed paint colors, some of them running together. Four peach circles, slightly off center of the page, stood for the head of each member of their family. Four uneven lines deviating off each “face” acted as extremities -- two arms and two leg each. Although the figure on the left looked to have a leg coming out of his or her ear.

He smiled at his little princess, “It’s the most beautiful piece of art I’ve ever seen.”

At her father’s praise, the little girl shyly tugged at her pigtail and twisted in her purple overalls, “You always say that.”

Spike smiled down at his little girl, placing a kiss on the top of her head. “Because it’s always true.” Seeing that his wife had not immediately followed their daughter into the house, he glanced out the front door. “We’ll go help Mommy get the groceries out of the car, yeah?”

His little girl dutifully took off down the stairs, wanting to be the most helpful to her mother. He settled the baby into his car seat sitting on the coffee table, leaving the front door open behind him in case he woke up, and went outside into the afternoon sun.

His wife and daughter had a sort of relay system going. Buffy would hand a light bag to her daughter, and Mia would race into the house with it, plopping it onto the kitchen table and quickly sorting through it to find any goodies her mother may have bought, particularly Gushers. Finding nothing but vegetables and some sort of meat, Mia would run back outside to grab another bag.

Stepping behind his wife, who was bent over the trunk unaware he was there, he took a moment to admire the view she presented him with, before taking his wife around the waist, pulling her flush against him. She smiled, turning her head and leaning back for a kiss.

“How was your day, sweetheart?” he asked, playfully swatting her on the backside.

She thrust a bag heavy with milk and fruit at him, giving him a sweet kiss and slammed the trunk, “We got in that Edwin Austin Abbey painting that I was waiting for. And I pretty much have everything set up for the children’s art show on Thursday. How’d the trial go today?” She asked following him into the house and around the corner to the kitchen.

He placed his bag on the table before relieving Buffy of hers, “Mr. Mayfield was found guilty on all accounts.”

Buffy smiled, hugging her husband, “Congratulations, baby.”

“Mommy! The baby’s up!” Mia was bent over the coffee table, lightly poking at her baby brother. The baby reached out, wrapping his tiny fist around his sister thumb. Mia giggled and kissed her brother, then ran out of the room.

Buffy scooped up her youngest, cradling him in her arms, cooing at him and running her fingertips over his face. The baby scrunched up his nose in response to the tickling touch, burring his head into his mother’s shoulder.

“Can we watch ‘Beauty and the Beast’?” Mia danced back into the living room, eating a Fruit Roll-Up. Her father followed into the room behind her, his own Fruit Roll-Up in hand.

“Sure we can,” Buffy answered, her daughter already popping the tape into the VCR.

Buffy curled up against her husband on the couch, his arm wrapped around her and boot stretched out rocking his son’s swing back and forth as the baby chewed happily on his teething ring. Mia lay across her father’s lap, her head resting in her mother’s.

“He’s bloody stupid, Daddy!” She pointed at the television as the movie’s antagonist flickered across the screen, a proud smile on her face.

“Yes he is, baby,” Spike chuckled, ruffling her hair. He leaned down to his wife, placing a kiss on her head “Love you,” he whispered into her hair. Buffy smiled up at him, lifting a hand to bring him down to kiss her. With that the couple settled in for an afternoon with Happily Ever After.

THE END





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