Spike finished his meal at about the same time as Dru. He rose, beginning to gather together his plates and cutlery. He was stopped by his girlfriend’s surprisingly strong, delicate-looking hand on his arm. When he shot her a questioning look, she gave him a silky smile and shook her head, her dark hair caressing her pale cheeks, her wide eyes strangely cold.
“Buffy will take care of it, my Spike. Come now, it’s time for Mummy and her boy to play.”
Although her voice had dropped to the husky purr that usually made him rage with desire, he felt uncomfortable with her blatant display of lust in front of her sisters, one of whom was only twelve years old. Shooting a sidelong glance at Dawn, he was surprised when she just carried on eating, not even looking up at Dru’s tone. Buffy’s hollow cheeks had flushed slightly, but she was collecting the dirty plates without once raising her eyes. He frowned, but Dru tugged impatiently on his arm and he gave in, letting himself be dragged upstairs and into her room.
Downstairs, Buffy and Dawn shared a disgusted look at the faint moans already emanating from above them. The older girl’s expression softened when her sister finished her breakfast, politely putting her knife and fork together to signify that she was full. As Buffy began to stride over to the sink with the pile of plates, a sudden dizzy fit made her stumble sideways. The crockery in her grip wobbled, and then Dawn was there, carefully propping her up until she could make it to the sink.
“I wish you’d eat something, Buffy. It scares me when you’re like this.”
Her voice was strained with worry that no twelve year old girl should know, and Buffy smiled fondly and a little sadly down at her. They began cleaning up in the usual pattern, Buffy washing the dishes and then handing them to Dawn, who dried them and put them away. When the job was done, Buffy sat obediently at the table and slowly ate her way through a banana. She rose to put the skin in the trash, smiling at a relieved Dawn. Grabbing the phone, she ushered her small sister into the living room.
“I’ll call Janice and tell her you’re going over there, okay?”
Dawn’s lip trembled. “But that means you’ll be here on your own if she…” Her voice trailed off as she blinked hard.
“I’ll be fine, Dawnie. She’ll be too occupied with Captain Peroxide up there anyway.” I hope she added silently.
After calling and making arrangements for Dawn, Buffy waved as the little girl crossed the street and met her friend and her mother, who were waiting for her. The three turned and grinned at her, and she returned the smile before shutting the door. The smile faded. She couldn’t hear anything from upstairs, which either meant that Dru and Spike had quietened down (yeah, right…) or that they were no longer doing… that. She hoped that it was the latter.
Feeling a shudder of dread, she suddenly darted to the phone. Gripping it with trembling hands, she dialled the familiar number, trying to steady her breathing before a panic attack set it. “Wills?”
“Buffy?” Her best friend’s worried voice calmed her somewhat.
“Dawnie’s at Janice’s for the day, and Dru has her new boytoy over, but if he leaves… I don’t want to be alone today.” She hated the quiver of fear in her voice, holding the phone to her ear with a shoulder as she squeezed the marks on her arm. The pain cleared her head in moments like this.
“I’ll be over in a few, alright? Just- just stay out of her way, okay?” She could hear the pent-up rage in Willow’s voice; the redheaded girl was usually pleasant, but she had a stubbornly protective streak a mile wide. And a really mean shin-kick.
“Sure, just… Wills?”
“Yeah?”
“Hurry.”
Her only reply was the dull buzz of the dial tone. Slowly replacing the phone on its cradle, she looked distantly down at the dark stain spreading on the sleeve of her shirt. The pain had dimmed to a dull throb, as though it were someone else’s arm. She leant against the wall for a moment, eyes closed in weariness. Feeling someone nearby, she turned and yelped when a pair of curious blue eyes met hers.
“Care to tell me what you meant, kitten?”
****
Soon after their little romp, Dru had swept into the bathroom and run a bath. He was faintly surprised when she didn’t ask him to share it, claiming that she wanted to smell like roses, and her knight shouldn’t taste of little girls. The crazy-talk she indulged in had been endearing at first, but having worked with people who genuinely suffered mental problems, it was starting to grow irritating. Shrugging, he’d let himself be banished from the bathroom.
He was too embarrassed about his girlfriend’s, and even his own, behaviour earlier to confront her sisters yet; after all, they hadn’t exactly made an effort to be quiet or discrete, had they? On the way back to the guest room, he heard a faint moan from one of the bedrooms. He paused uncertainly, but when the pained groan sounded again, his natural desire to help others forced him to enter the room quietly. Turning, he gave a muffled gasp of shock.
Lying on a large double bed was a woman. The room reeked of old sweat and the nauseating stink of alcohol. The window was firmly sealed shut, he could see from the doorway, and breakable items like the lamps were nailed tightly down. He saw the remains of the breakfast tray on the floor at the side of the bed, the food only half-eaten, though the pills were gone. Pity swelled in him as he studied the woman. Dru’s mother.
Her hair was lank and greasy, messy curls hanging just below her chin. Her nose was starting to go red from excess alcohol consumption, her face heavily lined and her skin a sickly yellow. Her body was thin, though remarkably healthy-looking, clothed in a simple cotton nightdress. When she groaned again and looked at him through glassy, unfocussed eyes, he had to back out of the room quickly. That stare was unnerving. Had Dru really been caring for an alcoholic mother her whole life? And what of when she was away, like the three-month trip she’d taken to LA?
Still thinking hard, he realised that he was starting to get the kind of headache that he usually only sorted out by driving. Hearing a muffled voice from downstairs, he figured that Buffy was on the phone. He’d seen Dawn leaving with her friend earlier. Creeping quietly downwards, he paused for a moment to try and remember which stair creaked. He really hadn’t meant to eavesdrop on Buffy’s conversation, but her almost frantic tone made him stop and pay attention.
“…her new boytoy over, but if he leaves… I don’t want to be alone today.”
He frowned. She wouldn’t be alone if he left. Dru would still be here, after all, and so would Mrs Summers. Not, of course, that he could see her being much help if there was an emergency. But surely Buffy wasn’t afraid of being left with Dru? Shaking his head at the thought, he tuned out the rest of the conversation, instead studying Buffy, though she had her back to him and obviously hadn’t noticed him yet.
This was the most he’d heard her say since he arrived, and her voice enchanted him. It was soft and smooth, soothing the nerves despite the shakiness. (Was that fear he could hear? No, it couldn’t be.) Her hair hung down her back in a long ponytail, clean but not with the shiny lustre Dru’s seemed to always have. He could see the knobs of her vertebrae when the curtain of hair shifted, which made him frown. That wasn’t healthy.
She had the phone held between shoulder and ear, and he could see her gripping her left arm tightly. He shifted, concern filling him. Had she hurt herself? When she hung up, however, he realised that she’d let go of her forearm, and deduced that she wasn’t that badly hurt. The next moment she was slumped against the wall, the dark exhaustion in every line of her body making him want to sweep her into his arms and never let her go. Then she turned to face him, eyes wide with something primal, something that bordered on sheer, blind terror. Seeing that look directed at him, he blurted out the first thing on his mind.
“Care to tell me what you meant, kitten?”
He hadn’t meant to call her a pet name. Really he hadn’t. But she looked so much like a deer caught in the headlights one moment, eyes wide with shock and that other thing he didn’t want to think about, that when anger flared in the breathtaking green depths of her eyes, he was reminded of a harmless kitten, claws out and hissing. She didn’t answer for a long minute, the spark fading from her eyes as she ducked her head, gaze dropping to the floor. Her voice was a low murmur.
“I was talking to my friend Willow. She’s coming over.” A pause. “I don’t like to be alone.”
He replied with a charming smile. “What are friends for?”
For a moment that seemed to last an eternity, their eyes met as hers rose painstakingly slowly. All of a sudden he was drowning in her haunted stare, surrounded by a sea of green pain. He inhaled sharply when the silent communication was ended by the sound of the bathtub draining upstairs. For a moment that animalistic something flashed in her wide eyes again, before they darted to the top of the stairs as though she expected a monster to emerge at any minute. Then she looked back at him, distant once more.
“Drusilla will want you there.”
And they were back to the soft voice and the shadow-like stillness she seemed to have mastered. Cursing the untimely interruption, he nodded curtly and rose. A flash of something painful bolted through him as he turned to leave her, his heart jumping in his chest as his breath hitched. Then the feeling faded, leaving him frozen on the staircase. What the hell was that? Not looking back, he began to climb the stairs, feeling her burning eyes on him until he was out of her sight.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Sorry this chapter's a little shorter than the last. I've decided to make a mailing list for my updates, so if you want to be added, email me at Magic_Wonder04@hotmail.com