~~~Chapter 6 ~ Anticipation
Spike wondered where the baby spinach leaves he bought came from, he knew they must be imported. It was too late for spinach to do well in Gloucester, so he was certain it wasn’t local. Very nice, though. He washed and towel-dried them so the dressing would cling. He found canned mandarin oranges at market and drained them, then put them in the fridge to cool. The dressing was simple with honey and balsamic vinegar and an herb or two. He certainly never ate the like when he was a young man in London. Cook, while having a kind heart, did not come by the title honestly. She couldn’t cook worth spit. After his father died, his mother was a sucker for anyone with a sob story and if she couldn’t give them money, she gave them a job; not much pay, but it always came with a roof over their head and a warm bed.
When he checked the kitchen in the morning he found that Giles had a working broiler and decided a nice rare steak was the way to go. He would season it and let it rest. The fine cut cost a bundle but it was worth it. If he kept a section rare enough it would help his blood supply last a little longer before having to make a trip to a blood bank or a butcher.
He smiled as he looked over the table. They thought he was a monster? They’d find out tonight that he was a monster with very fine taste. Giles’ dinnerware left a lot to be desired so he exaggerated the mismatch and it looked fine. He remembered to buy candles and it turned out that Giles had some. Of course, the kind he had were utility candles in white, but they burn nice enough so he used them too. What would dinner with a vampire be without candles?
The glassware was another matter altogether. There were plastic glasses that he summarily dismissed and tumblers. No stemware at all. Bloody heathen! He needed glasses for three kinds of wine not to mention the brandy later and Giles didn’t have that many …so, he would rinse them between the salad and dinner and again between dinner and dessert. “Make nice chit chat at the same time and impress ‘em both with my domestic skills and clever banter,” he thought aloud. With a little time until sundown and guests not expected until seven, Spike settled himself for a kip in Giles’ favorite chair.
~~~
Buffy wasn’t herself. Oh, she wasn’t sick, or mopey, or bitchy…well, she wasn’t any bitchier than usual, but there was something not right and that was definitely not of the good, thought Dawn. She had three calls from her this week and that in itself was weird, but the reason for the calls was even weirder. She just wanted to talk.
I think I’m scared.
Something must be up and she just hasn’t reached her quota of talky-talky before she can really get to the meat. I’ve been away at school more than I’ve been home for two semesters and she called me exactly…not at all…until now.
Yup, I’m scared.
Buffy is like that. For all her big, important “I’m the boss-Slayer of all Slayers” decision making, she can’t come out with a simple statement without beating it to death with meaningless blah, blah, blah first. So, I guess all I can do is put on my headset when the phone rings and paint my toenails while I wait for her to get to the point. I hate speakerphones.
Of course, I could just not answer…but then I’d never find out what’s up until it’s too late…also not good. Probably another apocalypse… coming at mid-term…just what I need, another distraction. All this Core Curriculum crap is getting to me. Thank the gods that I was able to take one elective to keep me interested. Shit! If all you’re doing is Core Curriculum, college is nothing more than High School, Part 2! I mean…how many times do you have to study English Composition and frigging World History? Oh yeah, excuse me…it’s Anthropology, the Study of Man Through the Ages…which, if you don’t mind my saying so, is frigging World History! And Math? Puleeze!
The phone rang and interrupted her internal rant. She jumped at the sound and spilled the nail polish.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” She hissed, hopped off the bed to grab some tissues and knocked over the nail polish remover too… “and yet again more shit!” she yelled this time. The phone kept ringing and ringing it’s cute little electronic Toccata in D theme as she tried to mop up the damage thinking she would sincerely like to pitch the thing through the window.
She grabbed the phone, flipped it open and said a loud, harsh, “Hello!”
“Hi!” answered Buffy, in a tone that was both cheerful and suddenly cautious. “Um, this a bad time?”
“No,” Dawn sighed, “Not a bad time, the phone just made me jump and I ….oh, never mind…you had to be here. What’s up?” She walked over to get her headphone off her desk to make ready for what was surely going to be a long, boring diatribe about nothing.
“Giles called last night. Left a message in my voice mail. He’s sending Kennedy away. Wants me to go over there.”
Four blunt sentences, more information in four blunt sentences than she had in three half hour phone calls. “Holy Shit! What happened?”
“Dawn, your mouth is getting like a sewer. Is that what you’re learning at college?” Oh God, Buffy thought, I am turning into a mother. She was careful not to say, my mother, even though it was true. She never wanted to have any negative memories of her mother. She was rapidly turning her into a saint. She had to remember, her mother was a wonderful, whole, live woman, not a saint, but she felt as though remembering being pissed at her was somehow disloyal. Can’t ever escape Mom issues.
“Yeah, Buffy, I’m taking the advanced class considering I grew up on the Hellmouth! Besides, I think Kennedy getting fired deserves at the very least a Holy Shit!”
“Not fired.” Buffy emphasized. “Sending her away, two very different things.”
“You’re right! She said abruptly. “Very different. Fired would have deserved a FUCKIN’ A!! … My bad.” Dawn said as she smiled knowing full well that she was sending her sister right over the edge…. her purpose in life after all.
“DAWN!” Came the expected reply!
Dawn appealed, “Look, can we just get on with it? What happened?”
Buffy began with a deep sigh, “To be honest, I don’t know. I tried to call this morning, which is this afternoon there, and I spoke to his secretary who said he was unavailable. I reminded her WHO I was and that he would be available to ME. She was really nice and said he was unavailable to anyone. He was only in briefly in the morning, asked her to cancel any appointments for the rest of the day and said he would have his cell phone turned off. So I can’t talk to him. I did leave a message on his cell, but he hasn’t called back and its night there now.”
“Wow,” came Dawn’s hushed reply.
“A definite wow…anyway, I’m gonna go. That’s the real reason I’m calling this time…to let you know I’ll be out of the country for a while. Don’t know how long. I’ve booked a flight tomorrow afternoon for New York. My flight to London leaves at midnight. What I’ll do when I get there will depend on whether or not I can get hold of Giles between now and then…you know,… whether I’ll stay in London or go right to the school.”
“Buffy…..(a long pause) Buffy, what’s going on?” Dawn said in a conspiratory tone.
“I wish I knew, Dawnie. I never thought I’d say this, but I wish I was having Slayer dreams. At least then I’d have a puzzle to work on….all cryptic and metaphory.” Buffy said. “I have been having something, I don’t know…feelings…. senses….tingles….. That’s why I’ve been calling.”
Hah! I knew it, thought Dawn while Buffy continued, “I thought talking to you might help me tune in, you know? I’m sorry if I’ve wigged you.”
“Well you did, you know? Wigged me, I mean. But I’m glad you tried to get help from me even if you couldn’t figure out how to say it….”
“So, OK! Um, I’ll call you from New York to let you know if I have any more info. I love you, Dawn, bye.”
“Wait,” Dawn cried urgently. “Buffy….”
“Yeah, Dawn?”
“You want me to go with…?”
“Aw, that’s nice, Dawn, but no. I don’t know what I’m walking into. Something funny is going on and I’m equipped to handle funny. I know you’re strong and smart and experienced, and all that and I promise if I need you, I’ll call. You’re only just a few hours away,” said Buffy.
“Promise?” Dawn asked.
“Promise.” Buffy said.
“OK, then. I love you, Buffy, even if you are the skankiest sister anyone could ever have.”
“Thanks Dawnie,” Buffy smiled. “I love you too.”
~~~
After he dropped Spike off at Giles’ place, Xander headed back to his (cough, cough) office. The secretaries were all busy at their jobs engaged in some sort of work. He never could figure out just what it was they did. He guessed it was important and he did notice that the pile of stuff he went through every day sort of appeared and disappeared every day. It had to come from somewhere and go somewhere but he had no clue where. He hadn’t yet gotten to the point where he could say, “Get me that file on so ‘n’ so!” So nobody ever brought anything back.
He smiled and said ‘Hi’ to them, but none of them so much as raised an eyebrow.
What’s up with that? he thought.
He spent the rest of the afternoon reading Watcher stuff and mostly wondering what was happening with Kennedy and how what seemed like a pretty cool, out of the ordinary day could go so wrong so fast. Apparently all this wondering made the day go by pretty quickly and he realized the office outside was getting quiet.
Finally, the oldest (at least he thought she was the oldest…she sure looked the oldest) and probably most senior of the secretarial pool gently knocked on his closet and said, “Mr. Harris, we’re all leaving for the day. Was there anything else I can do for you before I go?”
“Um, no thank you. Everything locked up OK? Anything you need from me?” He said. He never knew what he was supposed to do when they asked that. There ought to be a manual, he thought.
“No sir,” was all she said.
No help there, as usual. Nothing left but to say, “Goodnight, then.”
She smiled, so that must have been the right thing for him to say. Good. Got it right. Yay me!
He cleared his desk. This only took a moment. After all, all he had to do was put the magazine away in his bottom drawer under the files, locked the drawer and his office door and zipped down the stairs, waved a “so long” to Binne and stopped dead in his tracks. It wasn’t Binne.
He turned and approached the desk, “Hi there,” he said.
“Good evening, sir. Is there something I can do for you?” the buff looking fellow in the security uniform said. He had a really, really, really thick Scottish accent…what do they call it?…a brae?…burr? something like that.
“You’re new! Is Mr. Binnemon OK? I’m just used to seeing him here in the evenings,” said Xander.
“You’re American!” the guard replied.
Xander answered with a long drawn out, “Yes,”…. “and you didn’t answer my question.”
“Oh. Yessir, I apologize. I’m what you call a temp. The name’s MacGregor. I’ll be here through next week.”
“Nice to meet you MacGregor, I’m Xander Harris, but you still didn’t tell me about Binne.”
“Well, I don’t know, do I? I was instructed to come here for the remainder of this week and into the next. I’m sorry I’m no’ more help,” the man said.
“OK, well thanks anyway, Mac, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then,” Xander said as he turned to leave.
“It’s MacGregor, sir.”
“Right.” Xander exited the building. Touch-eeee…..he thought! Why is it night guards are always older guys? Makes noooo sense whatever. OK, so this guy was buff but no spring chicken. What can they do in an emergency except get hurt and let the bad guys go? If these guys had any clue what kind of a place this was we’d be doing our own guarding. Nobody in their right mind would work here…..Well….that’s not true, he went on. I’m here…he paused…realizing where his train of thought was taking him…. he quit right there!
~~~
He heard them long before he saw them. He was just rounding the corner into Giles’ driveway when he heard Giles shouting and pointing at his entryway. Uh-oh…
“Surely you could have called me. Done something other than breaking in the door?”
As calmly as he could manage, but still yelling, Spike said, “I could’o done a lot of things, but THIS is what I done. Got the job done dinnit? What’s the fuss? The boy’s a carpenter by trade…he can fix it!”
Barely containing his anger and working to lower his voice, which had the effect of being even more menacing, “I would have told you where I have a key hidden,”. …. and finally muttered a frustrating, “Anyone could have walked right in.”
“Oh, come on Rupert, what have you got worth stealin’….a teabag?”
Clearly affronted, Giles said, “Never you mind,” and stormed through the gaping entrance.
Xander and Spike shared a conspiratorial glance and followed him in, Spike pitching his half-smoked cigarette onto the lawn.
“Giles, it’s an easy fix. I even brought the wood. I thought I’d get here before you did. You never told me you had a hidden key,” Xander said.
Deflated, Giles said, “Doesn’t that defeat the purpose?”
Spike snickered as he lit the candles and Xander looked sheepish.
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