“You invited Riley!” Buffy hissed, wanting to full on shout out her annoyance, but at the same time trying to keep her voice down so as not to make a scene.
“Yeah…So?” Faith said reaching forward and taking a sip of her drink. She wasn’t really paying much attention to Buffy, not only because she didn’t understand what she’d done wrong, but also because she was trying to listen to the band that was playing. They were good, just her kind of music, but they were sat around the corner away from the stage. Faith had wanted to go see them properly as soon as she heard them start playing, but Buffy wanted to finish her drink first, then she’d spotted Riley walk past in the distance and ever since had been in interrogation mode. It got to the point where Faith just gave up and admitted he was here because she’d invited him.
“What happened to girls’ night?” Buffy asked, “I thought you just wanted to take me out and cheer me up, just the two of us?”
“I did, B, its just…” she paused, “Look okay, I lied about girl’s night.”
Buffy grabbed her bag from the seat next to her and stood up. She walked swiftly away from the sofas, leaving Faith behind without another word.
“B, wait!” shouted Faith, who got up and was now running after her. She caught up with her eventually and spun her round, “B, I’m sorry. I wanted you to get out of that apartment, and every time I asked you to come to the Bronze you said no.”
“Because this is where he works!” Buffy said, furious at Faith for not understanding why she didn’t want to be here.
“I told you he didn’t work here anymore.” Faith said trying to argue her case, “My friend told me he got fired, but you still wouldn’t come out. I tried for ages, and then you finally said yes.”
“To a girls’ night, Faith. No men and no one else, but you and me!” Buffy felt slightly betrayed, and angry at herself for being so gullible.
“I didn’t mean anything bad by it, B. I really wanted you to meet up with Riley again. I thought if I mentioned him being here before hand you’d be too scared to come, but if you saw him here you could have a good time with him and forget about things.” Faith said, a desperation creeping into her voice as she pleaded with Buffy not to go because of this.
“You shouldn’t have lied to me.” Buffy said bluntly.
“But there’s no harm done.”
“Faith! I was gonna tell him I just wanted to be just friends!” Buffy said, anger renewed at her friend’s ignorance. “Now you’ve done this he’ll think I invited him, and he’ll get the completely wrong idea!”
Faith became frustrated as well, “What the hell, B? Why do you just wanna be friends with him?”
“He’s just not…He’s not the guy for me.”
“This isn’t about him, it’s about Spike.” Faith said abruptly, “Spike’s not coming back. He left Buffy! When are you gonna realise that!”
Buffy felt tears sting her eyes, but she did her best not to let them fall; she tried to stop her lip from quivering, and calmed herself down. She felt her blood boil with anger, not only at Faith, but at everyone who’d given her advice the past few months. She’d finally had enough, “I’m not an idiot, Faith.” she said through clenched teeth, “I know he left; it was ME he left not you!”
Faith kept her mouth shut.
Buffy continued, no longer caring about making a scene, “I realise it every day when I wake up alone. So don’t make me out to be living in a dream world…I live in the real world! And in it I KNOW Riley isn’t right for me. You’re telling me to wake up and I’m already awake; you just don’t see it. I could easily pretend Riley and me could work, but we won’t.” She started to raise her voice more, unable to keep her feelings in check, “Stop pressuring me to go out with everyone that has a pulse! If you and everyone else really cared about me you’d back the hell off!”
With that she stormed off, but as she passed the bar a hand flew out and gently grabbed her arm. “Buffy, you okay?”
She looked up, following the arm that had hold of her all the way up to a familiar face. When she looked up into his eyes Riley let her go and stepped forward into her space.
“Riley, hey.” she said trying to hide her face from him.
“You okay?” he asked his eyebrows narrowing in concern.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
She forced a smile but he saw right through it, “What’s up?”
Buffy sighed, she was caught out. “Riley look, you’re a really nice guy, but.”
“But?...See I knew something was wrong.” he said still smiling.
Buffy couldn’t believe he was still smiling. She was well aware however that she could still potentially hurt his feelings; she really didn’t want to do that. The other day when they met up things didn’t get off to a great start, but she’d relaxed and they’d talked for ages. She felt bad afterwards, that maybe he’d thought she was more interested in him than she really was. She was even more worried after what Faith had done, inviting him here. She’d come to see that day if nothing else that he was a really sweet, genuine guy, and now she knew that she really didn’t want to lead him on. But she didn’t know how to let people down without them getting hurt; it wasn’t like she’d had too much practice with all this. And her last and only relationship had ended in heartache for both parties.
“Buffy,” he said after she failed to gather the courage to continue, “I think I know what you’re going to say.”
“You do?”
Riley let out a defeated laugh, “Yeah.” He turned around and leant forward against the bar. Buffy mirrored him and waited for him to continue. “I’m not blind, Buffy. I could tell there was something wrong last week; I know you don’t want whatever this is between us. And if it’s not what you want you shouldn’t push it on yourself. I can just tell you’re not ready.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell people,” she mumbled under her breath.
“What?”
“Nothing,” she said, “Just…Riley I think I owe you an explanation. You’re a really nice guy, and I wouldn’t want you to think this has anything to do with you. And no one ever believes that ‘its not you, its me’ thing…so I think I should tell you why, and to be honest I think I want to tell you.”
“You can tell me anything you want, Buffy.” he said, and for once Buffy returned his gentle smile with equal vigour.
She began to tell him everything about Spike; well not absolutely everything. She left out the whole thing about the guy in question being her brother. Although Buffy hadn’t thought of him that way for a long time, she didn’t think Riley would understand that part, and after wailing on Faith she kind of needed a friend. She didn’t want to risk his judgement; after all he was bound to chime in with something regarding her pathetic-ness as it was. Everyone else seemed to have an opinion on it.
“Buffy, can I be honest with you?”
Buffy nodded meekly, a bit afraid and waiting for him to give her the inevitable ‘pull-yourself-together’ speech.
Riley continued, “You don’t have to get over him.”
That shocked the hell out of her. She looked up quickly and saw he was being utterly serious. She must have pulled an amusingly confused face because he suddenly laughed and then continued.
“I mean, not right now. I’m not saying pine after him forever and never move on. I’m not saying all your friends are wrong, but I bet most of them have never been in love…It takes time. It’s supposed to take time. And I think you’re doing really well.”
Buffy took that information in, processed it, and dwelled on it for a long time. Then she smiled before tentatively asking, “So…we’re okay then?”
He laughed again. “I’m not saying I’m happy you’re hung up on someone else. I wish things were different. But I don’t wanna push you.” he said turning around to lean back against the bar instead of over it. He looked across and saw the band start to get ready on stage for their next song. Then he continued “I don’t think you’ll be over him anytime soon, so I’m not gonna say I’ll wait…But if we can be friends, I’d like that. If when you get over him we’re still in a place to…”
Buffy looked at him again and he paused.
He continued carefully, “…then that’s fine…If not, we’ll just be friends, no pressure.”
“You’re a really nice guy, Riley.” she said turning to face the same way as him.
“Thanks.” he said. He smiled at her, then looked back at the stage when the band started to play, “You’re a great girl, Buffy. And he’s an idiot to let you go, whoever he is.”
Buffy didn’t say anything back. She couldn’t; she couldn’t move or even speak.
“Buffy?” When he turned back to her and saw her shocked face eerily fixated on something he became worried; she looked as if she was going to cry. “What is it, Buffy?”
Buffy absentmindedly laid a hand on Riley chest whilst never removing her eyes from the stage. “Spike.” she said staring into the eyes of the man that broke her heart.