Chapter 5: The Morning After
Buffy opened her eyes, finding herself on a camp cot in a dimly lit room, with a man's arm draped over her.
“Oh my god. What the--?!”
She jumped to her feet and backed away from the cot, looking frantically around in an effort to orient herself. She soon recognized the basement, as well as the vampire her sudden noise and movements had startled awake. She glanced down, relieved to find herself fully clothed.
“Spike...What the hell happened last night?”
As soon as the words were out, things started coming back to her. She interrupted him before he could reply. “Wait. I remember...” She pointed at him. “I thought you were dead, and it was a huge deal for me... For her.” She returned to the cot to sit on the edge of it beside him. “Who were those people?”
He took a minute to sort through his thoughts before answering. “Us, I think,” he whispered. “Who we're gonna be. Or maybe who we could be.”
“I'm not sure it's who we should be. Not me, at least. She was carrying around enough guilt, regret, and misery for at least three people.” She turned to look at him, studying his eyes in the dim light. “Except when she looked at you. I mean, there was still some guilt and regret, but...”
Spike nodded, understanding. “Same.”
Buffy reached out to take his right hand in her left, and slowly interlinked their fingers. “...There was trust, and friendship, and...”
“Yeah.” He looked at their joined hands. “They had a lot of history.”
“That started like ours. Which is kinda wild. I mean, how do you get from 'I want to stake you with a spoon' to that in less than five years?”
“I haven't a bloody clue.”
She started to withdraw her hand, but lingered on his ring. “I remember her looking at this, and thinking of it as hers.”
He frowned at the silver skull on his finger. “He thought so, too, for some reason.”
“Well, I guess we'll find out.” Buffy stood up and started to back away, toward the stairs. “But, you know... Later.” She shifted her weight awkwardly. “I need to go. School and all. You'll be leaving at sunset?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I'll get out of your hair.”
“Good.” She started up the stairs, but his voice stopped her.
“Slayer?”
“Yeah?”
“I think I'm gonna stay in town for a bit.”
“Ok.” She fought back a smile as she resumed her climb. “Just don't start any trouble.”
In another place, in another timeline, Buffy slowly stirred awake, still smiling from a highly detailed dream that had ended with her falling asleep in Spike's arms on the old camp cot in the basement of a house that no longer existed. When she opened her eyes, she was in her own bed in her apartment, thousands of miles away, and completely alone.
She ran through everything that had happened in her dream, remembering it all in such precise detail that she found herself doubting it had actually been a dream by the time she'd showered and dressed. “It had to be a dream,” she told herself as she started a pot of coffee. “If we'd actually traveled back in time, things would be different now. ...I hope.”
The lock turned in the front door, and Dawn's voice called out as it opened. “Buffy? Are you up? I could use a hand!”
She hurried to the door to take one of the grocery bags from her sister's arms. “Why exactly are you grocery shopping at eight o'clock on a Sunday morning?”
“Thanks. Because I'm in dire need of an omelet, and we forgot to buy eggs.” She bent to pick up a small package from beside the door with the hand Buffy had just freed. “The other stuff just kinda appeared in the cart. ...by magic.”
“Uh-huh,” was Buffy's skeptical reply as she led the way to the kitchen. She peeked into the bag she carried. “Do you really want to blame frozen pizzas, Doritos, and Kit-Kats on magic?”
“That's better than blaming me, right? Also, Kit-Kats are clearly magical. Nothing tastes that good without mystical help.” Dawn gave her a sly grin. “Especially dipped in your morning coffee.”
Buffy's attempt at chastisement instantly crumbled. “You win. Coffee, Kit-Kats, and omelets for breakfast.”
This proclamation was met with a cheer of victory as Dawn tossed the package on the counter and began unloading groceries. “You're such an easy mark when you're hung over.”
“I'm not hung over. I just like coffee flavored Kit-Kats.”
“Uh-huh. Sure. You were up talking on the phone with Xander half the night again because you were sober.”
She frowned. “Dawn, I didn't call Xan last night, and I wasn't drinking. I actually crashed early.”
“Great. Then you've taken up talking in your sleep.” She opened the refrigerator to start putting away the groceries. “So are you going to open that, or what? It's addressed to you.”
Buffy picked up the package to inspect it. It was a narrow, shallow box, maybe a foot long, wrapped in plain brown paper. There was no address on it, only her name. “This was hand delivered,” she murmured. “Did you see who put it by the door?”
“Nope,” came the reply from behind the refrigerator door. “It wasn't there when I left, though. And I was gone less than an hour.”
“Creepy.”
“If it's a mail bomb, don't open it.”
“How am I supposed to know--? Never mind.” She tore off the paper, opened the box, and gasped. “Oh my god... Maybe it wasn't a dream.”
Dawn poked her head over the refrigerator door. “Huh?”
With a shaking hand Buffy tilted the box to show the contents to her sister. Inside was a wooden spoon with a very familiar looking stone mounted to the inside of the bowl.
“Whoa! I know that rock.” Dawn closed the door and moved to get a closer look. “It looks like the amulet that--”
As she spoke, Buffy tilted the box further to offer a better look, and the spoon began to fall out. Instinctively, she grabbed for it. But the second she touched it, the force of the magic she triggered caused her to drop it again. A bright, golden flash of light filled the small apartment kitchen, sending Dawn stumbling back against the refrigerator.
When the light faded, Spike was standing in the kitchen with them, staring down at the wooden spoon on the floor in confusion. He slowly raised his eyes to the woman standing on the other side of it.
“Buffy... What the hell happened last night?”