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CHAPTER 17

The next morning I awoke to Dawn shaking me and I could hear Connor doing the same thing to Will. “Elizabeth, wake up. It’s almost time for grandmother to come with breakfast. You overslept.” Dawn’s voice was laced with panic.

I tried to open my eyes but the room was way too bright with both the overhead light on and the sun shining in through the windows. “Oh, God.” I groaned as I brought my hand to my head, which felt like a jackhammer was pounding inside it.

“I’m up, I’m up.” I heard Will say as he tried to get Connor to stop shaking him. He sat up in bed revealing his naked chest.

“Will! Where is your shirt?” Dawn screeched. “If grandmother sees you like that we’ll all be punished. What’s going on with you guys? We’ve been trying to wake you for awhile.” She was absolutely frantic, petrified of grandmother’s wrath. “Hurry up, get dressed.”

Surely, we didn’t oversleep that much. I glanced at the clock, which read 8:45 am, only fifteen minutes until grandmother came with breakfast. Note to self – don’t ever drink a full bottle of wine again.

Will got up and put on the shirt and jeans that still lay on the floor next to his bed and stumbled into the bathroom to comb his hair and brush his teeth. I hurriedly put on my jeans from the day before, the sudden movement making my head spin and my stomach churn. Oh God, I was going to be sick.

I held my hand over my mouth and ran to the bathroom. Knocking violently on the door, I yelled, “Will, get out! I’m gonna puke.” Seconds later, he opened the door and I rushed past him to lean over the toilet, barely making it before I emptied the contents of my stomach.

As he stepped out of the room, Drusilla walked in with the breakfast cart. “What are you doing?” She looked suspiciously at the bathroom and then at Will, standing right outside the door. “Where is your sister?”

“I’m here,” I called from the bathroom.

“Why were you in there together?” She asked harshly to Will.

“I was brushing my teeth. She got sick, had to kick me out. I guess she had too much ice cream cake yesterday.” Will answered calmly, trying not to unleash grandmother’s fury.

I came out of the bathroom, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. She narrowed her eyes at us. “Why are you both wearing the same clothes you had on yesterday?” She didn’t miss anything.

I glanced nervously down at my wrinkled shirt, but Will was quick with an answer. “We were really tired from all the activity yesterday of seeing mom and the birthday celebration. We fell asleep before we could change.”

“Hmm, I don’t know if I should believe you.” Drusilla said as she continued to glare at us. Slowly, she started to walk over to the twins, who were standing by the windows. “Dawn, is your brother telling the truth?” Grandmother asked as she bent over so she was eye-level with Dawnie.

Dawn swallowed and nervously nodded her head.

“Speak, child! I asked you a question.” Drusilla yelled at her.

“Y-y-yess.” Dawn stuttered, glancing over at Will who smiled at her reassuringly. “He’s telling the truth.” She quickly looked back at grandmother.

Dru stared into her eyes, almost as if she was trying to reach into Dawn’s mind. Her concentration was broken when I ran back into the bathroom to get sick again. Coming to the bathroom door, she called to me smugly. “Gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins, Elizabeth. Maybe this will teach you to obey the word of the Lord.” The door to our room closed and I was thankful for the timing of my illness as it got grandmother to leave. I wasn’t sure if Dawn was going to hold up against her interrogation.

As I sat on the tiled floor of the bathroom, I heard Will talking to Dawn. “Dawn, you did good. It’s okay to tell a little white lie like that.”

“I don’t want to get punished.” She whimpered.

“And you won’t. We just need to stick together as a team, just like you did. See, we’re all fine.” She must have been placated since the next words I heard were Will’s again. “Connor, it looks like you get your wish a day late. Since Elizabeth is sick, we won’t have any lessons today. Once you finish your breakfast, why don’t you guys go upstairs and have a free day, ok?” Will asked in a chipper voice.

“Ok. Is she really sick?” Connor asked a bit concerned.

“She’ll be fine. It’s just an upset stomach from too much fun yesterday.” Will said. “Go on and eat while I check on her.”

Will entered the bathroom and walked over to the sink to turn on the water. He came over to me, gathering up my hair so it wouldn’t fall into the toilet and placed a cool wet cloth on the back of my neck. “It seems the ritual is complete. Did I mention it’s not officially over until the person celebrating their birthday gets sick? Probably not, huh?”

“I want to die.” I said as he laughed at me.

“Nonsense,” he said while picking up a brush to comb out my bed tangled hair. “You’ll be begging me to do it again before long. I seem to remember something about more fun with alcohol at New Year’s.”

“If I claim I don’t remember, does it mean it won’t happen?” I asked as I relaxed under the gentle stroking motion of Will’s hand.

“Nope, sorry.” He said as he gathered up my hair and ran it through his fingers before tying it back in a ponytail. “You have beautiful hair, like golden silk.”

“Uh, oh. The poetry is starting, I must be hallucinating.”

“Very funny.” He said standing up. “Get up off the floor, brush your teeth and wash your face, then come eat something. You’ll feel better. We’ll veg out all day down here while the twins occupy themselves upstairs. It’ll be fun.” He left me with my head cradled over the basin.

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True to his word, I did feel a bit better after eating, my stomach surprisingly holding the French toast down. We passed the rest of the morning lying on our respective beds, staring up at the ceiling while playing an insightful game of ‘would you rather.’

After learning that Will would rather be Batman than Superman since Bruce Wayne was just a regular guy doing super human deeds rather than Clark Kent who was born with his special powers, I started thinking about the story Will wrote for my birthday.

“Will, what were you thinking about when you wrote the new story?” I asked still staring at the ceiling.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it seemed very metaphory to me, like it was supposed to get me thinking about certain things.”

He turned over on his side to look at me. “What did it make you think about?”

“I guess I never thought of mom as helpless in this, but I kind of put her in Merrick’s place when he tried to get Quentin to stop the ritual. He really didn’t have a choice, so he went along with it because he had to even though he didn’t like it. I guess it made me see that mom didn’t really have a choice either. She went to grandmother for financial support and didn’t get it, but she got this offer instead so she took it.” I finally turned my head to look at Will, who was grinning. “I guess I got your point.”

“Yeah, but there was more to it than that. I mean Buffy lost her powers, but in the end it didn’t matter, she still came out on top because she’s strong-willed, smart and she’d do anything for the people she loves. We’re stuck in here, but we’ll make it through because we have those same traits. All of us got that from mom and dad, not just you, but me and the twins too. Look at Dawnie this morning. She totally stood up to grandmother this morning not with her fists, but with her heart, because she loves us.” Will was completely impassioned.

“And in the end, Merrick came through because he loved Buffy. He saved her just in time to rebuild their relationship.” I interrupted toying with the locket hanging around my neck. “So I guess I just need to believe that mom will succeed at the plan or know when to call this quits without completely ruining the trust between us.”

“Exactly. When we started this whole thing, she said we’d be in here until Christmas, six months at the latest. I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt because as far as we know the plan is still going as scheduled. She knows what’s best for us.”

“I guess you’re right. You did win the bet after all. So I’ll be the dutiful, trusting daughter again for the time being, but there is a time limit on my trust. Eventually, I’m going to start questioning her again if this goes on too long.” I wanted to make it clear to Will that I wasn’t going to just go along with this plan forever, even if he was willing to.


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Author's Note: I just wanted to give you all a heads up that I may have to go back to the once a week updates on Fridays. I'm an accountant and the year end busy season is quickly approaching, which means I will be working 10-12 hrs a day (if not more) for the next few months. I want to keep the updates as regular as possible so I think if I do this it will eliminate any long lulls that may occur if I don't. I will still post on Tuesdays if I'm writing fast enough.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. I promise I'll be getting to the heavier Spuffy stuff soon, but remember they are blood relatives so they can't go too fast :)

I appreciate your patience in both matters!!





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