Chapter Nine B

“Are you girls alright for cleaning up? I think I need to head on up to bed. If you have too much homework, Dawn, just leave it and I’ll get it all in the morning.”

Buffy looked at the clock over the stove and noted the time—7:00—before answering her mother. “Don’t worry, we’ve got it under control,” she tried to look reassuring as she told her mother to go to bed, but inside Buffy was worrying more than ever. It seemed that her mother had less and less stamina with each passing day.

“Thank you and goodnight girls. Sweet dreams to the both of you.”

Dawn waited until her mother was upstairs and they’d heard her bedroom door close before turning to Buffy, “If I get the dishes done, do you think you could look over my history paper for me? I know you’re not big school girl and all,” she halted Buffy’s interruption, “but I just want someone to read over it for me to make sure it’s not horrible. Please?” she nearly begged.

Buffy looked at her sister suspiciously, Dawn had never asked her to look over a school paper before.

“I would have Mom do it, but she’s going to sleep and I don’t want to keep her up just so she can read my stupid paper. Please?” she asked again.

Buffy still thought that there was more to it than Dawn was letting on but she didn’t want her sister to go wake their mother—and she didn’t really feel up to doing the dishes anyway. “Sure, just hand it over and I’ll read it for you.”

“Yay! Thank you.” Her plan had worked; Buffy wasn’t going to try to do the dishes and was not, therefore, going to wear herself out. “Just let me go get it out of my room and I’ll be right back!”

Buffy couldn’t help but grin slightly as she watched her giggly sister bounce up the stairs. “Don’t be too loud,” she quietly reminded Dawn, not all that sure that she would even hear her. Some days she wished it were possible to send those monks a thank you note for giving her a sister; Buffy wasn’t sure how well she’d be coping if it were just her and her mother right now.



“Buffy!”

When she heard her sister’s voice—full of panic and fear—Buffy flew up the stairs with more energy than she knew she had—more than she’d had in weeks; but she was too scared to even notice or care.

She was at her mother’s door in a matter of seconds, but still, when she saw what was happening, it didn’t seem fast enough.

“Dawn, sweetie,” Buffy tired to keep her voice calm, knowing she had to be the adult one here. “Go call 911 and tell them that Mom’s having a seizure…make sure they know this is the first time, okay? Buffy moved while she talked, over to the bed until she had taken Dawn’s place and was holding their other down on the bed.

“If they say to do anything in particular, let me know. Then call Giles and tell him to what’s happening and ask him to come pick you up.”

“Why does he have to pick me up?”

“Because sweetie, they won’t let both of us go in the ambulance with her; I’m not even sure they’ll let me go and I don’t feel like I can drive us their. Can you do all that for me Dawnie?”

“I…I think so,” she replied, her voice shaky, fearful.

“And stay own there to wait for everyone—to make sure they can get in.” Buffy wondered if Dawn was even aware of the grateful look she shot her sister upon hearing that request.



Buffy tried to keep herself detached from the situation; stay in charge. It was hard, but so far she was managing. It took a great deal of effort, due to her weakened state, to hold her mother’s arms down when they started flailing in a way that made Buffy think her mother was going to hurt herself, but again, she managed.

Sunnydale didn’t have the brightest police and paramedics, but surely someone having a seizure in their own home would be something that even they would know was something that fell in their hands. Someone passed out in a cemetery or a girl with unidentifiable neck wounds, sure, they could avoid that for a while, wait until the demons were gone. But surely with this…surely they’d hurry.

She could vaguely hear Dawn on the phone, needing to focus on something other than the fact that something was very wrong with her mother. Much more wrong than she, in her ill state, had realized.

“It’s okay, mommy. Dawnie’s calling Giles and 911; you’re going to be okay. Just…just a little while then you’ll be okay…” Buffy trailed off, focusing on the place where her mother’s wall moved into the doorframe; it was something simple, something that wouldn’t…that wouldn’t require her to pay attention to the current situation.



Buffy was so focused on not focusing that it took one of the EMT’s shaking her shoulder lightly for her to know that the ambulance had arrived.

She watched in unhearing silence as the man and woman talked back and forth between each other before settling her mother onto a board complete with neck brace and restraints. If she was acknowledging how she felt—which she wasn’t—Buffy would have been frightened, seeing her mother in that position.

As they carefully, quickly carried her out of the bedroom, Buffy finally snapped out of it, at least somewhat.

“Can I…can I come?”

Without looking back, the woman answered Buffy’s question.

“You can, but your sister has to stay here.”

“That’s okay,” Buffy said numbly, “Giles is coming.”

“Alright then, hurry up.”

With a quick explanation to Dawn, along with a gentle hug and pat on the back, Buffy assured her sister that everything was going to be just fine and Giles would be there in a minute to take her to the hospital as well.

Dawn stayed inside as her mother was carried out on the stretcher and Buffy followed. Sitting slowly down on the sofa, Dawn just kept her eyes on the still open front door. She knew it was not safe to keep the door open after dark, especially given that this was Sunnydale and this was the Slayer’s house.

But she just sat and looked at it, waiting.

It was only ten minutes after Buffy and her mother had…left that Giles came through the door, an anxious, rushed look on his face.

“Where are they?” he asked, more frantic than Dawn had ever heard.

“Buffy went with Mom; they’re going to the hospital. Mom’s…They’re at the hospital.”

“Come then, we’ll go find your sister and see what we can…find out about your mother. I’m sure everything will be fine,” he added as an afterthought.

Dawn grabbed her jacket and followed him out of the house, looking to him to lock the door.

“Yes, right, the key, of course,” Giles searched his pockets for several seconds before coming up with his key ring; locating the key to the Summers’ home he locked the door and led Dawn towards his car.

She was only mildly surprised to find Willow, Xander, and Anya in the car waiting. Both Willow and Xander had looks on their faces that she knew meant that Anya had said something…Anya-like again.

If not for the fact that they were on their way to the hospital to find out about her mother who had just had a seizure, the situation would have passed for routine.





TBC.......



and since I found out that the awards site where Silently Broken is nominated not only has reader voting, but 'vote for me' buttons, I thought I'd be shameless (well for me) for a moment ;-)...

(I think voting's up till the first-ish....that's when I belive judging ends so...)


.....and you don't know how happy I am that this time it's letting me put an image in--the site refused to cooperate when I tried putting it in the Halloween fic :(