Chapter 10
"Did things seem frosty in here to you tonight, Elizabeth?" Henry dried the last plate as his wife handed it to him from the now emptying sink.
"Are you referring to how Buffy pushed the food around her plate and went straight upstairs to sulk after dinner, and William managed to look everywhere in the room but at her? Or that they’ve been this way for the last three days?"
"Well, if you want to be very observant, that’d be about it." Henry stacked the plate in the cabinet with the others. "Do you suppose they’ve had a fight?"
Elizabeth leaned her head against his shoulder. "I’ve asked Buffy, she’s pretending everything is fine. Won’t tell me anything. Perhaps it’s time to corner the other party."
"How are you, William?"
Spike carefully placed down the glass he’d finished rinsing and turned from the sink. "I’m well, Mrs. Summers. And yourself?"
"Just fine. Could I speak with you for a moment about something?"
"Of course." Her tone was no nonsense and he quelled a slight queasiness inside. There was something about Mrs. Summers that always made him want to sit up a little straighter, and be sure to say ma’am when he addressed her. And now . . . Had Buffy gone to her? Talked to her about what had happened?
She sat at the kitchen table and he followed her lead, drawing out the chair with a scrape that sounded painfully loud to his ears, even over the sounds of the game show that drifted from the living room.
"Would you like some lemonade, William? I made some this morning."
He’d actually just finished a glass. "That would be lovely, ma’am."
She busied herself preparing it for a moment. When she placed it before him and sat down, he took a tentative sip. The liquid was tart on his tongue, drying out his mouth as he waited for her to speak.
"William, I’d have to be blind not to notice the attention you’ve been paying my granddaughter."
He swallowed hard and took another sip of lemonade as she continued.
"Which I understand. Buffy is a lovely young woman, and well, circumstances being what they are, I’d be surprised if you hadn’t noticed her. But she’s also someone who’s been hurt a great deal, and she’s so very young still."
"Mrs. Summers . . ."
She held up a hand and halted him. "William, let me finish, please. I respect you. I think your grandfather has done an admirable job in raising you. And I know you haven’t always had the easiest of circumstances, either. I don’t believe you would deliberately toy with my Buffy’s heart. But William, in a few short weeks, she’ll go home, and so will you."
"Mrs. Summers, I know that. And yes, I agree with you, Buffy is . . . very special. If circumstances were different . . . . But they’re not. Buffy and I, we’ve talked, and we’ve reached an understanding. I value her friendship, more than she knows, and I don’t want to endanger that."
He was startled when her hand softly covered his, as it lay on the table, and gave it a soft squeeze. "Thank you, William. You‘re doing the right thing, for both of you." There was a softness in her face that made him feel as though her concern wasn’t just for her granddaughter that took away some of the sting of her gentle warning.
"You’re welcome, Mrs. Summers."
She rose from the table and disappeared into the living room, the strains of the Wheel of Fortune theme sounding through the doorway. He contemplated the glass of lemonade but found no answers. Maybe it was time for something a little stronger. So much for not being his father.
He pushed back the chair, and disappeared into the night.
"Buffy, you got some mail today. It’s on the table in the hall." Her grandmother’s voice carried from the kitchen as she came down the steps.
"Mail?" Buffy trotted out into the hall and flipped through the envelopes. She ignored the largish one with a Royal Air Mail stamp, and kept going until she found one in a colorful envelope with a cartoon cat stenciled in the corner. A big smile broke out as she snatched up the envelope. Had to be Willow. She hadn’t heard from her in weeks.
"Oh, and Buffy, can you take that letter from his grandfather to William? He didn’t come in for breakfast this morning. He must be in the greenhouse."
She made a face in the direction of the kitchen but picked up the letter and headed outside across the yard. Why couldn’t he get his own mail? She wasn’t his delivery girl. She wasn’t his anything. He’d made that clear enough.
She pulled open the door to the greenhouse and leaned inside. "Spike, are you in here?"
"Buffy?" He popped his head out of the office, sounding surprised. They hadn’t spoken since that day on the path, except for oh so polite exchanges at dinner or whenever her grandparents were around. She’d even stopped going down to the river at night, not knowing what she would do if he were there too.
"Mail delivery." She crossed to the doorway and proffered the envelope, waiting for him to take it. He just stood there, arms crossed, eyes drinking her in with a hunger that she felt to her bones.
Everything froze and she let herself pretend for just a moment that things were alright between them. He still had the power to make her body flush from head to toe with just a glance and her heart to ache with the need to be close to him. She missed everything, from the way his hair smelled when he buried his face in the curve of her neck, to the funny pet names he called her, to the way he really listened when she spoke. As if she were something special.
She hated that he’d taken that all away.
"It’s from your grandfather." She shoved the envelope at him until he took it and turned on her heel. She thought maybe he called her name, but she pretended not to hear.
He sighed as he watched her walk away.
He hadn’t meant to stare at her that way, but it had caught him off guard, seeing her waltz in like she had for so many weeks, bright hair bouncing round her shoulders and beautiful smile that lit up his morning. Except this time the smile had been missing and he was the reason.
He tapped the letter that now lay on the desk. Maybe he should talk to Mr. Summers about leaving a few weeks early. Not prolong the strain of seeing her everyday until the eventual parting which meant holding her at arms length. They were all but done with the reason he’d come for the summer, just loose ends to tie up. It might be best for them both if he simply left.
He picked up the envelope and dug through the desk for a letter opener.
Buffy settled comfortably against the tree. She’d missed this. The quiet solitude of her place by the stream. Somehow, as the summer had rolled by, she’d stopped thinking of this as her place, and had started thinking of it as their place. It was time she reclaimed it.
She impatiently ripped into the envelope, eager to hear what Willow had been up to and all the gossip from home. She scanned the scribble she was familiar with after years of passing notes in class to each other.
There were the usual greetings, but the heart of the missive soon became apparent. Willow had met a boy. And not just any boy. A boy who was sweet and cute, and best of all, liked her back.
As Buffy read through the pages, with stories of trips to the movies and walks on the beach, she couldn’t help but make comparisons to her own summer romance. She wondered what Willow would say. She could imagine sitting down with her at their favorite coffee shop, Willow urging her for details over a cup of something steaming and frothy.
She’d tell her that he was older, charming, drop-dead gorgeous. That he had eyes she could get lost in, and the sound of his voice made her toes curl. That when he kissed her the whole world fell away and nothing else mattered.
And Willow would squeal with excitement over the dreamy guy who sounded so perfect.
And then she’d have to tell her the rest. That it was never meant to be anything real. That he didn’t love her. That he didn’t think she was worth taking a chance on.
Buffy walked to the edge of the stream and slowly ran her fingers through the water as the tears welled up in her eyes. She’d been angry, at first. Then numb with disbelief. Maybe it was finally time to accept it. Time to move on. Her tears fell into the water, to be carried away by the swift moving current.
Spike opened the letter. Heavy weight paper, rich cream color, embossed crest at the top, bold signature in heavy ink at the close. Very much his Grand. He missed the old man.
His father was on some sort of retreat, which Spike read between the lines to mean rehab from his latest bout with the bottle. His mother was apparently somewhere in the Aegean, cruising with her latest. His grandfather was fine, however, aside from the fact his usual round of yearly check ups were coming up.
Spike grinned. His grandfather’s detest of the medical profession was longstanding, and he always tried to find ways to ditch those appointments every year. He wondered what ruse he’d come up with this year.
He read on. Family talk done, he knew his grandfather would move to his real love, business. It appeared that the latest quarterly numbers looked good, and the preliminary reports on expanding the California vineyards would be done before the end of the month.
He was a bit surprised by the close. His grandfather was a reserved man, not prone to open displays of affection. But the final lines of the letter caught him off guard. The words penned there expressed affection and pride in him, in what he’d accomplished and in what he would become. Words that any son would love to hear.
As he slowly read over the letter once more, he knew his decision was made. It was time to go home, where he belonged, where he was needed.
He’d committed to going to Los Angeles at the end of the week to meet with the professors who had assessed their research and to get feedback on his grandfather’s proposal to finance further development. He’d do that, then see about booking an earlier flight for London.
They’d both be better off.
Buffy turned the next clipping in the file folder as she slowly sorted through the research the librarian had dropped off.
"So you were born here, Gram?"
Her grandmother nodded. "In this very house. My father was one of the original settlers of Sunnydale."
"Really?" Buffy asked. "Wow, I didn’t know. Dad never talked about that kind of stuff."
Her grandmother’s expression was resigned. "Henry never carried too much for Sunnydale. He always wanted something bigger. Your grandfather and I had hoped he’d want to take over the vineyard, but that wasn’t to be, I suppose."
They were quiet, lost in their thoughts for the moment as they continued sorting.
"Was Gramps from here too? Did you grow up together?" she asked.
Buffy was surprised at the faint pink that stained her grandmother’s cheek and the small smile that played at her lips. "No, your grandfather wasn’t from here. He was from back east, New York."
"How did you meet then?"
"Oh, he came to work here for my father. It was during the Depression, hard years, and so many were without. Papa hired my Henry on, said he seemed a likely sort, if a little soft."
Buffy smiled, thinking of her grandfather’s weather face and toughened hands. "Gramps was soft?"
Her grandmother chuckled. "Oh yes, he was something of a city boy back then, came from a good family in New York City, who’d sent him off to college. He’d gotten a degree in botany, which was tolerated as he came straight back, went to work with his father on Wall Street as was expected. And then the crash wiped them out."
"So he came here instead?"
"He did. Head full of knowledge, but not a lick of practical experience."
Buffy grinned. "But he stuck around? Found something he wanted?"
"Yes, I suppose he did."
A noise at the door caused Buffy to turn to see the topic of their conversation in the doorway.
"Gramps, come here." Buffy patted the seat beside her. "Gram was just telling me about how you came to work here."
Her grandfather took the proffered seat. "Oh yes, that was a good many years ago now, wasn’t it?" He grinned at his wife. "Your father certainly did put me through some hoops to win your hand, Elizabeth. But it was worth it."
Buffy quirked an eyebrow. "Oh really? Did your dad not like him, Gram?"
Her grandmother gave her a speculative look, as if reluctant to pursue the topic. "I was just a bit young, Buffy, and your grandfather didn’t want me rushing into things. Your great-grandfather wasn’t sure Henry would stay, you know."
Buffy eyed the pair. "How young were you?"
"Young enough. I was completely smitten when he first arrived." She smiled, "It took him a year to work up the nerve to try to court me, though."
Her grandfather snorted. "Work up the nerve indeed. More like get you to thaw!"
"Did you play hard to get, Gran?"
Her grandmother laughed. "No, not really. I kept waiting for your grandfather to ask to call on me and stop just making moon eyes and he never did. So I decided to try to make him jealous."
"With that insufferable Snyder. Still don’t know what you saw in him," her grandfather grumbled.
"Not a thing, sweetheart, as you well know. Just needed to wake you up."
They gazed into each other’s eyes and Buffy couldn’t help but envy the love that still radiated off them after all these years.
"So after you gave Gramps a little nudge, everything worked out?"
Her grandfather chuckled. "You’d have thought she was Rachel and I was Isaac, the way her father made me work for her, prove myself. Her father wouldn’t let me start calling on her officially until she turned eighteen."
"Eighteen? You couldn’t date until you were eighteen?"
The faint pink slipped back into her grandmother’s cheeks. "Well no, not officially. I was the baby of the family, and so everyone was just very protective."
"But you still saw him, didn’t you?" Buffy crowed. "Why Gram, I’d never have guessed."
"Now, Buffy. It’s not as though your grandfather and I were doing anything improper."
Buffy rolled her eyes. "I know Grammy, it’s just romantic. Love at first sight, Gramps working for you, just everything. And still in love."
Her grandmother smiled across the table. "It was. And we still are."
"Well, on that note, I’m going to leave you two love birds alone." Buffy rose from the table with a wink.
"Don’t forget, Buffy, we’re having the Thurbers over for dinner tonight. I’ll need you to help me a bit in the kitchen and to set the table."
"Sure thing, Gram. See you later."
The Thurbers arrived promptly at six o’clock, Owen in tow. Buffy had just finished setting the table when she heard them in the living room and she straightened her hair and moved to the doorway.
"Hey, Buffy." He smiled down at her and she wasn’t sure if she liked having to tilt her head back so far to return the greeting. But she did.
"Hi, Owen. How’s your summer been?"
They chatted on their way into the dining room and Buffy found herself seated next to him, with Spike directly across from her as the meal began.
He didn’t look at her, seemingly deeply enthralled by Owen Sr.’s description of a new pruning technique they were using as the vines ripened towards harvest.
She focused on Owen Jr. instead. Football seemed to be a defining factor in his life at the moment, as every conversational gambit seemed to come back around to it. She gave up and went with the flow. Practice would officially begin next week and he’d been running drills since the beginning of July.
Scintillating.
She glanced across the table at Spike, trying to imagine how the evening would have been if he’d been next to her instead of Owen. He was so animated, the corner of his eyes crinkling as he laughed at some joke. She loved the way he laughed.
Why couldn’t it have been for them like it had been for her grandparents? They’d overcome all kinds of obstacles and still loved each other after all these years. She stared at the beans left on her plate, pushing the green clumps around into an abstract design. She guessed she just didn’t inspire that kind of devotion.
"So there’s a little get-together later tonight, some of the team and their girls. Kids from school. Think you’d like to come?" Owen’s voice broke through her longing.
She wanted to say no. The thought of hanging out with a bunch of strange people didn’t really appeal at the moment. But then she noticed he was looking at her, from across the table, his bright blue eyes waiting for her to make a decision. Almost a challenge.
She lifted her chin and turned to the boy next to her. "I’d love to, Owen."
"All right!" Owen sounded excited enough for both of them.
Which was good, as she’d already turned away, waiting to see if Spike would react, if the blue would dim or he’d blink and look away. He did neither. She was the one who broke the stare and turned to ask her grandmother for permission.