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Jealousy’s a Bitch

“Hi,” he said reaching for her hand as Chris had. Buffy swallowed and shook his hand.

“Hey.” ‘Nick’ smiled at her. She smiled back even though inside she was freaking out. This was starting to be a regular thing; seeing people from her dream world. First James, Julie, and Juliet. And now him.

“Why don’t we all sit down and talk,” Julie suggested. She took a seat beside Juliet, closely followed by Chris and Nick, who happened to end up sitting beside her. How convenient.

“So you guys get all your work done?” Juliet asked them.

“Yes we did,” Chris replied. “And now we have a whole weekend off to do whatever our hearts desire.” He leaned over and kissed his girlfriend.

“What have you girls been up to?”

“Not much. Had class, but that’s about it.” He nodded.

“What about you Buffy?”

“Nothing really. Just hanging around the house, watching TV.”

“Sounds exciting,” Chris said.

“Oh yeah.”

“So I don’t know about you guys, but I could really use a drink.”

“I’m right there with you one that one,” James said.

“Well why don’t you boys go and get all us something?” Juliet said sweetly.

“I guess that could be arranged.” They took drink orders and headed off to the bar.

“You just gotta love men,” Julie said.

“Yeah we’re awesome.” All three girls laughed.

“So Nick, anything interesting going on in your life?”

“Not so much. I mean work mostly. I recently got promoted.”

“That’s great,” Julie said looking at Buffy, who returned a look with raised eyebrows. Seems he had really made something of himself. And working in a law office was quite different than what she had known his job to be. She wondered if he was as handy here as Sunnydale “Nick” had been.

Xander. One of her best friends. And now she was on a pseudo blind date with him. She had most certainly not expected it to be him. Angel maybe, but not Xander. He looked pretty much the same, only more put together. Which was understandable since he seemed to work in the business world. She wondered why he didn’t have a girlfriend.

Juliet and Julie began carrying on their own conversation, which just left Buffy and Nick with nothing to talk about.

“So, this is a nice place,” Nick said looking around.

“Yeah it’s great.” Buffy looked down at her hands. What on earth was she supposed to say to him? Sure they had been friends in her “other world” as she had started calling it, but here they had never even met. Before either of them had a chance to say much of anything Chris and James returned.

“Here we go ladies…and Nick,” Chris said as he and James placed drinks in front of everyone.

“Thanks. Hey how about we dance?” Julie said grabbing Chris’s hand and pulling him towards the dance floor.

“But the drinks…”

“…will be here when we get back.” He sighed and let himself be dragged away.

“What about you? Wanna dance?” James made a face at his girlfriend.

“Must we?” She made a pouty face. “Okay fine.” He got up and started following her onto the dance floor. Buffy noticed him glance back at her, but then quickly turned back around. She made a face at them.

Of course they would leave her here alone with Nick. They were trying to set them up after all.

He looked at her a bit nervously.

“So…”

“So…”

“Would you umm…like to dance?” She was afraid he was going to ask that.

“Sure.” No need to be rude, even if this was a bit weird. He held out his hand and she grabbed it following him then out on the floor with the others. She looked at Julie who seemed to be proud of herself. Juliet too was smiling, but James was giving her another look. One that she wasn’t quite sure of. She noticed how close he and Juliet were dancing. Why, why did she notice? Why did she care? Oh right…she didn’t. At least, that’s what she kept telling herself.

Nick put his hands on her waist and she put her on his shoulders. She didn’t recognize the song that was playing, but discovered that it didn’t really matter when Nick started talking.

“I want you to know that I had nothing to do with this. Chris asked me if I wanted to hang out with him and some of his friends tonight. I didn’t realize until about ten minutes into the evening that I was being set up.” Buffy laughed.

“Yeah tell me about it. Julie informed me on the way here that Chris was bringing a friend from work that I may find interesting. I was about ready to kill her.” He smiled.

“So do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Find me interesting.”

“I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.” They continued talking for the rest of the song, and into another one. Seems Nick was more like Xander than any of the others had been like their “other” selves. She only hoped that he didn’t get the wrong idea. He was nice and all, but she just didn’t think she would ever be able to date someone, who had (in a way) been her best friend for six years.

She looked back over at James and Juliet. They looked like they were about ready to go somewhere a bit more private. But it didn’t matter. They could do whatever they wanted. But did they have to be acting so…into each other? Buffy mentally scolded herself. ‘Stop acting jealous.’ She wasn’t of course. She just didn’t think he should like anyone else. Was that so much to ask?

-----------------------------

James was having issues. Here he was, dancing with his girlfriend, and thinking about someone else. Who does that?

Ever since Buffy had arrived he couldn’t stop thinking about her. He found himself noticing how good she looked. What was that about? He hadn’t thought something like that about another girl in a long time. Sure he noticed other women, he was human after all, but never gave them a second thought. Buffy on the other hand, he couldn’t get out of his mind. It was odd. He hadn’t known her that long and really didn’t know much about her at all besides she had only recently been released from a mental hospital. It surprised him how everyone seemed to be pretending that never happened. He knew that they just wanted to help her get back into the swing of things, but it didn’t really seem like she needed that much help. If he would have just met her on the street he never would have guessed that she had spent six years in a coma. She seemed perfectly normal.

He had been careful about what he had said to her afraid that she would freak out on him or something, but she hadn’t shown any signs that she was crazy. Unless you count the fact that she’d freaked the first time she had ever seen him. She’d called him some crazy name and looked at him like he’d grown two heads. After that he had planned to stay away from her, that is until his mom told him they had been invited to the Summers residence for a party and that she really wanted him to go. He had watched Buffy that night, trying to mingle with all of her parent’s friends. He had been the only one there even relatively close to her age. When he saw her going out the front door for some reason he followed her. That’s when the girls had shown up. They had told him to invite Buffy to go with them tonight, and he was going to; they just showed up before he had the chance.

When he’d taken Juliet home she went on and on about how much she liked Buffy and that she didn’t seem that crazy at all. And she would know a thing or two about crazy. Her mother had been in and out of hospitals the majority of her life. He had actually always half expected her to turn out like her mom, but so far she hadn’t. Though sometimes she would go on about the stars and that concerned him a bit. He really hoped she didn’t lose her mind.

Julie too seemed to really like the girl. They had had a long conversation that night after the party and she said the same thing; Buffy seemed as normal as the next girl. So when tonight came around he had been looking forward to it. But now, he wasn’t so sure. It had bothered him the way Buffy reacted to Nick. She had looked at Nick almost the same way she had looked at him when she’d first seen him. But she didn’t call him a strange name. Instead she shook his hand. She still looked at him rather strangely, but they seemed to be getting along pretty well.

Now they were dancing. When Juliet had wanted him to dance, his first reaction was to say no. For some reason he didn’t want to leave Buffy alone at the table with Nick. But he figured that if he made a big deal about it then it would just make everyone suspicious. Not that they had anything to be suspicious about. He was just worried about his new found friend. But soon after he and Juliet had made their way to the dance floor Buffy and Nick had come to dance as well. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that either.

He mentally cursed himself. What the hell did it matter anyway? She could dance with whoever she wanted. But the feeling he was experiencing was almost like…jealously. ‘No way,’ he thought, ‘I am not jealous. I have a girl.’ He pulled his girlfriend closer. ‘Most definitely not jealous.

But as much as he told himself this, he still couldn’t shake the feeling.





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