"Buffy had a boy in her room when no one was home!" Dawn yelled, throwing Buffy to the wolves and rushing upstairs as her father turned on her sister. Buffy had only a second to react and she fumed silently at her retreating sister.
"Buffy Anne Summers!" He growled at her. "Who did you have upstairs? That Angel? You know you're not to have ANYONE upstairs ESPECIALLY when we're not at home."
"Daddy, I-" Buffy tried to placate him, "No, Angel and I broke up. I'm working on a project for English and I had my partner over, that's all. Dawn was down here being loud and she wouldn't go away and I had nowhere else to go-"
"You will NOT have boys in your room, young lady. For any reason. Do you understand?" Hank Summers repeated angrily.
"Yes, Daddy," she said softly, "it won't happen again."
He looked at his watch and swore. "Now get upstairs and get dressed. We're going to the club for dinner tonight with the Abrams. Tell your sister." He turned to leave the room.
"Yes, Daddy." Buffy said and obediently headed upstairs.
She banged on her sister's door and threw it open without waiting for a reply.
"Hey!" Dawn shouted at her. "Get out!"
"Thanks a lot, Dawn!" Buffy yelled back. "Don't think I'll forget that." She stared furiously at Dawn. "Get dressed we have to go to the club."
"I don't want to go to the club again," Dawn whined. "I want pizza."
"Not like we have a choice. Get dressed." Buffy left, slamming the door behind her.
Buffy wondered if it was possible to expire from boredom. The frustration had been rising all throughout dinner as she politely made small talk when spoken to and responded to Parker when necessary.
Parker was seated to her left and his older sister Claire was beside him. Their father was some big work contact of her father's and the families often met on social occasions. Parker was in her crowd at school, too, but he made her uncomfortable for a reason she couldn't define. She supposed he was good looking and charming enough, but there was something in his eyes, his manner, that reeked of insincerity to her.
He and Claire were now discussing the upcoming cotillion and how dreary it would be. "Buffy have you gotten your dress yet?" Claire asked her, taking a delicate bite of her fish.
"No." Buffy said, "I haven't found one."
Claire sighed, "It's so boring isn't it? All those whites and pastels. I've half a mind to show up in red and shock everyone." She smiled mischievously and flicked her brother on the shoulder. "No such worries for you boys, put on your tux and you're done."
Parker rolled his eyes. "At least you get to be comfortable. I'll be choked all night." His fingers found the knot of his tie and played with it.
She nudged him again, giggling, "Like stockings and heels are the height of comfort, not to mention everything that goes into preparation. Ah, what we must go through to look presentable." She smiled at Buffy. "At least the guest list is invitation only, not like the school dances." She sniffed. "We would have to live in a town with no suitable private school." She parroted the haughty tones of her mother, "That place is a nightmare." She set down her fork and smoothed one long brown lock down her shoulder absently. "You know, the food here has really gone downhill since the last chef left. The fish was so bland tonight."
Parker nodded in agreement.
Buffy fought to keep the distaste from her face. 'A nightmare.' Claire hadn't the faintest clue what a real nightmare was. Here they were, dining at the club, as they always did, eating food of a quality many people would never taste and turning their noses up at it, complaining all the while at the minor inconveniences they were forced to endure. Meanwhile, people, good people like William and his mother, had horrible things happening to them and real worries.
She felt a rush of disgust for them suddenly and for herself. They spent their lives heedless of anything beyond their world of privilege, never quite reaching or touching the real world around them, locked in their own little protected sanctuary…only coping with things like bland fish. 'I wish Claire had choked on it,' she thought viciously. The other girl's superficiality hit her like a club and she wondered if she'd ever been so blind and shallow.
Parker was talking. 'Damn it, Parker's talking to me, what did he say-' Buffy thought.
"So would you like to?" Parker asked.
'Would I like to what? Would I what?’ Buffy cast her eyes around the table helplessly. Dawn smirked at her, enjoying her sister's predicament, having giggled inside at the sight of her sister tuning out Parker's monotonous "me me me" drone.
"She'd love to!" Her father's voice boomed out.
"Oh, great." Parker beamed.
Catching the veiled warning in her father's eyes, she quickly said, "Oh of course!" She smiled weakly and uneasily wondered what she'd agreed to.
Dawn stared at her stupid sister. "Dinner and the Bronze Friday night." She sniffed. "God, you have to stop smoking crack, you're losing it."
Buffy sighed. She'd feared as much. "Just wait 'til Dad does this to you. You'll see how much it sucks." She started back to her own room.
Dawn said, "Buffy, wait-" Her sister turned. "Uh, about earlier." She made a face as though what she wanted to say pained her, "I'm uh…I'm sorry."
Buffy sighed again. "It's ok, Dawn. I know how he is. Please remember how understanding I'm being when you feel like throwing me under the bus next time."
"Oh, you mean remember how you didn't get all mad and retaliate?" Dawn said teasing.
Buffy narrowed her eyes at her sister. "Didn't retaliate YET. Goodnight, Dawn."
"Night, Buffy." Dawn said and snuggled back under her covers.
Joyce removed her earrings and set them carefully in their place in her jewelry box. "Hank," she said to her husband who was loosening his tie. "I don't think you should interfere in the girls' lives like that." She sat at her vanity and moistened a cotton ball, preparing to remove her makeup.
Tie in hand, Hank turned to her, "What do you mean?"
"Accepting a date with Parker for Buffy. You shouldn't force her to date someone just because you think he'd be appropriate for her." Joyce said seriously.
Hank snorted, "Appropriate? Like any young man is appropriate. They're all the same underneath, Joyce. I was one, I know." He tossed the tie on a chair. "At least this way she can be doing something to contribute to the family's wellbeing. It's good to network with the Abrams and more social contact can't hurt."
"Contribute?" Joyce looked at him, frowning. "Buffy contributes just by being a member of this family. What she's supposed to do is grow up happy and healthy and do the best she can in school. She's not a business asset, Hank!" Her voice rose.
Hank looked at her, his surprise and displeasure evident on his face. "What, you have a problem with Parker? What's wrong with the boy? He's from a good family, handsome enough, polite, well-spoken - what more do you want for your daughter?"
Joyce said stubbornly, "Someone Buffy wants to date. That's what I want."
"Like that lump Angel? What kind of name is that, anyway?" Hank mocked. "The boy had a Neanderthal brow and looked like he could barely string two words together. You really want those traits swimming around in our future grandchild's gene pool?
Joyce's disbelief was clear, "First, Angel could talk just fine. I've spoken with him many times and you've only met him once in passing. Second, Buffy is seventeen. There isn't even a thought about future grandchildren in my head, yet. She'll go to college, maybe have a career and hopefully find someone she loves to share her life with. There's no rush for her to grow up, Hank." She turned back to the mirror and dabbed the cotton at her eyeliner. "You'll be back on another business trip and lose interest again soon anyway." She muttered under her breath to herself as he headed to the bathroom and slammed the door.
Dru was incongruously perched on the stool behind the desk at the gym like an exotic bird that had somehow taken a wrong turn and landed in an unsuitably mundane setting. Clad in electric blue today, she was a bolt of vivid color against the smudged tan and white of the gym walls. She twirled a strand of her long hair idly as she waited for her father.
"Daddy!" She clapped at her father.
Mr. Crawford stared irritably at his daughter. "Dru, what are you wearing now?"
Dru jumped up from the stool to swirl around for him, modeling her attire. The gauzy, sleeveless dress hung loosely from her slender form and frothed in unexpected volume around her calves. The neckline dipped low, nearly to her belly button, and only two slender strings of silk near her breasts kept the top half from parting to reveal all. Paired with her boots, it was certainly an interesting choice in daywear. "You don't like it? It's new." She pouted.
"New? Where did you get money for something new?" He grunted at her, "Rent's due in two days and I expect you layabouts to have it in full or you're out on your asses."
She ignored his bad temper and ran up to him. "Daddy, we've had some paying gigs lately and more are lined up." She turned her eyes to his face almost wistfully, "We're quite good, really. Everyone says so."
He brushed past her to get to the desk and opened a drawer, paying little attention to her as he said. "What did you want, Dru?"
She trailed back to the desk and sidled closer to him, "I have a favor to do you," she said.
He snorted. "You're going to do me a favor. What's that, then?"
"I have the perfect employee for you," she responded earnestly.
He shook his head. "No. No friend of yours could possibly be anyone I'd want in my employ. Most likely steal or nap on the mats all day in a drunken stupor. No."
Drusilla persisted, "Oh, but you'll like this one. Really, you will. He already comes here. William. William Pratt. He," she flapped her hand in the air, "knows things already."
He looked at her and she wrapped herself around his arm, "Pleeease, Daddy." She wheedled. "He'd be ever so grateful."
He shook her loose. "I know the boy." He mulled it over in his head. "He's young, he'll work cheap. Knows the equipment. S'pose he wants evenings after school, yeah?" She nodded. "Tell him to come in and talk to me tonight. But I'll have no drugs or alcohol in this gym, be sure he knows that. He shows up pissed once and he's out." He frowned at her again and said, "Get out now, Dru. You know you can't hang out here."
She looked at him sadly. "Daddy, Devon dropped me. I was hoping…"
"Get out and catch the bus, Dru. I've no time for this today." Grabbing the ledger he was after, he stalked out of the room.
Rupert Giles had watched Buffy the previous day and caught her monitoring of the doorway. He'd noticed that young William hadn't appeared to assist her the last couple days and wondered at the cause. Giles had known Buffy since she was a baby and been entranced by her just as long. He'd met Joyce in school and though they'd dated briefly, the end result of their relationship had been a nearly twenty year friendship.
He'd visited the Summers home often during Buffy and Dawn's childhood and was fond of both of them, but Buffy was the one he thought of as the daughter he'd never had. Hank frequently left on long business trips during her infancy and Giles had regularly stepped in to assist a somewhat frazzled Joyce with her new baby. She'd been trying to get the gallery off the ground during that period and at the time money hadn't been available for hired help either at work or home.
He'd racked up long nights spent walking a fussy, teething Buffy so that Joyce could get some much needed sleep. He'd read many bedtime stories and spent hours watching her sleeping, tiny fingers curled around his thumb. She'd had him wrapped around those fingers ever since, despite the occasional fatherly frustration he felt with her.
He'd seen the disappointment in her face as she gathered her books to leave for her next class and wished he knew what was going on between William and her. Today he’d resolved to find out.
"Buffy," he said, sitting beside her, "Where's William? Is he not aiding you in your studies anymore?"
Buffy stared at the polished wood of the table. "No. I don't think he is."
"Did you have a disagreement?" Giles prodded gently.
"No…kind of…maybe?" Buffy made a face, "I don't know."
Giles sighed at her, faint exasperation traced out in the lines of his face. "You may need to be a trifle more specific than that, dear."
"Giles, it's such a mess. Everything is such a mess. This," she raised her wrist ruefully, "William, Angel, Cordy, Dad…"
"You know you can tell me anything, Buffy. Would it help to talk about it?"
"He doesn't think I'm his friend." She blurted out.
"Are you?" Giles asked solemnly.
"Yes, I think so. I mean, when you care about what happens to somebody they're your friend, right?" Buffy said earnestly.
"Sometimes," Giles said carefully, "it's generally a reciprocal thing."
"He's…his father died and now his mother's sick and…" Buffy said, "He was really sad and I tried to help him and now I think he's mad that I was there and…what can I do, Giles? What helps with something like that? How do you know what to do? He doesn't seem to want to be around me anymore and I don't know-"
Giles considered the mangled bits and pieces he'd just heard and said calmly, "Sometimes, Buffy, there's nothing tangible you can do. People who have had a great shock like that may act unpredictably and often take out their anger on the circumstances on the people around them. All you can do is let him know you're there and continue to be there for him as best you can."
Buffy snorted in frustration. "Not sure how I can be there, when he seems to want to be anywhere I'm not."
He removed his glasses and rubbed at them thoughtfully. "Give him a little time to sort things out, Buffy. Have some patience and he'll appreciate having someone to talk to when he comes around."
"I guess so." Buffy said softly. "I'm not very good at this, Giles. Tell me that when you grow up, it gets easier to deal with stuff like this."
"It never gets truly easy to handle these sorts of situations, Buffy, I'm sorry. All you can do is your best."
Buffy saw his white head above the crowd in the hall and dashed over to him. "William," she said. "How are you?"
William turned to her. "Hello, Buffy," and said nothing else.
"I um, I was waiting for you, but you didn't come. Are you-" she hesitated, "are you still going to be helping me? I mean…I understand if you can't but-" She looked at him nervously, "are you mad at me?"
He stared at her, "Always thinking it's something to do with you, hmm?" He said, somewhat teasingly and then continued, voice low, "I visit my mother sixth period now. Hospital's nearby."
Buffy flushed, "I-no, you just didn't mention anything and I-" she stammered, "Uh, maybe you'd meet me after school? I don't have cheerleading anymore, so…"
"Can't." He said bluntly, putting his book in his locker and withdrawing the one he needed for his next class. "Have a job at a gym downtown after school as of today. Sorry, I haven't much free time now." He turned back to her and saw the look of disappointment on her face. 'Chit probably thinks she'll fail now,' he thought, then took pity on her, "Look, you're doing fine. You've finished your paper, have some decent grades in history and English. You'll be alright now, just have to keep up the studying. Get your sister to read off the questions to you or something and Giles to proofread your papers." He started to leave her where she stood, then reiterated, "You'll be fine, luv." He walked away and she still hadn't said another word.
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