Title: Gossip (1/3)
Author: Liz

Rating: FRAO
Pairing: Buffy/Giles
Setting: Early S4, sometime Wild At Heart/The Initiative-ish
Feedback: Absolutely! Yes, please!
Distribution: Oakpark Street for starters. Anyone else, please just ask. I'd be honoured.
Disclaimer: It's Joss' world - I'm just playing in it. All characters/elements of BtVS belong to Mutant Enemy, FOX, UPN, and other folks who aren't me. Laney, however, is mine. Lucky me.
Summary: Rumours start to fly about the handsome, older man seen coming out of Buffy's room early in the morning.

Side Note: With all due respect to the wonderfulness of Tara, Oz and Willow are still together. Which skews the timeline just a bit, but I wanted to avoid the whole painful breakup issue and keep the story pre-Pangs/SB/Hush.

Special thanks to Gail for her valuable beta assistance and encouraging feedback!

Yet another all-night vigil with nothing to show for it. They'd kept at it straight through dawn, patrolling the entire campus several times over, but Buffy and Giles had yet to find hide, hair, or tazer of the mysterious commandos. Which was not to say the evening hadn't been eventful. Apparently word had gotten out that Sunday's position as UC Sunnydale's resident Big Bad was vacant. A new gang of vampires had moved into the old Psi Theta house with plans to resurrect the "freshman burn-out" scheme, and when Buffy and Giles stumbled across them, the ensuing dust-up royale made both Watcher and Slayer immensely grateful for each other's company.

Fortunately, in a rare display of learning from their mistakes, Buffy and Giles had begun patrolling together after the near-disaster weeks before. Buffy had proven herself capable of handling Sunday's gang by herself, just as Giles knew she would, but the moment he'd sent her away, he had felt it: the sure knowledge that his place was, and would always be, at her side. Withdrawing from Buffy wouldn't make his feelings fade, so he would be there - for her, with her - however she might need him.

Though Buffy didn't usually need back-up on routine patrol, nights like this one proved how quickly the routine could spring a nasty surprise. Besides, she reasoned, if he's out with me, I don't have to worry about finding strange women wearing his clothes and feeling up his cheese.

Not that she worried about it, exactly, it was just... seeing that woman - Olivia, he'd called her - standing there all gorgeous and glowy and satisfied... it gave Buffy an icky feeling in her stomach that she was quick to stash in the "old and gross" jar she kept handy for just such occasions. Of course, the way he'd leapt into the fray at the Psi Theta house, sword flashing as he took out several burly henchvamps with ease... she was having trouble cramming that into the aforementioned jar. So without lingering too long on the dangerous yet sexy gleam in his eyes, or the way he moved with such lethal grace, she resorted to the other one labeled "father's love" that Travers had so thoughtfully provided.

After all, if that was the way Giles felt about her, then the matter was obviously settled, and nobody needed to explore strange tummy feelings.

With the night's patrol behind them and still no commandos in sight, Giles walked Buffy back to her dorm. Dubious as it sounded, Buffy's offer of "hot plate tea" seemed a culinary experiment not to be missed, and now that they were spending time together again, he was in no hurry to part company.

Buffy had enjoyed the evening, dusty mayhem notwithstanding, and as she watched Giles pretend to appreciate her take on Twinings English Breakfast Tea, she decided that she definitely liked starting the day this way. Or ending it. Or whichever one they were doing at almost 6:30 in the morning.

"Seriously, Giles," Buffy teased, "I had no idea you were such an swashbuckler!" Giles raised his hand to fend off the compliment, but Buffy continued. "Of course, you did skewer a pretty mean Mayor-kebab, come to think of it."

"Yes, well, that was s-simply..." he began, blushing crimson at receiving such high praise from her, still mortified that a simple taunt from Wilkins had made him lose control so completely - and at what he had very nearly betrayed with his futile, furious gesture. Truth be told, Giles had hoped Buffy would avoid examining that moment too closely, and he blinked furiously as he tried to explain his actions. Fortunately Buffy came to his rescue.

"Hey," she interrupted. "He said he was gonna eat me. You took exception." Buffy grinned as she sipped her tea. "Highly impressive outburst, by the way." She didn't say it out loud, but the look in her eyes told him just how much the gesture had meant to her.

"Impressive, you say?" Giles took a moment to ponder her choice of words. "I could live with that."

"Damn straight," Buffy insisted. "Nobody better mess with my Watcher."

"Or my Slayer," he added, softly.

They spent several more minutes talking over rapidly cooling tea before Buffy noticed the clock by her bed. "Aw, crap," she moaned. "I gotta get ready for class."

"I suppose I'll leave you to it, then," he said reluctantly.

"It's no big," Buffy said, not wanting him to go just yet. "I'll be out of the shower in a minute if you wanna stick around."

But the image of Buffy wrapped in a towel, her wet hair falling around her bare shoulders - as well as his unbidden response to said image - convinced Giles that it was definitely time to be on his way. Leaving his sword in her care for the day (no sense carrying it around in broad daylight, even in a town as willfully blind as Sunnydale), he stepped out into the hall, admonishing Buffy to at least try to rest before they met again that evening, and she followed him to the door.

"Well, if you're going to keep me up all night again," she teased, "I expect donuts for breakfast. Jellies."

Giles rose to the bait. "Keep you up all night? If I recall, you were the one who said you wanted to have another go at it before we turned in."

"Yeah, well," she reminded him, thinking of the Psi Theta infestation, "I'd hate to think of what we'd have missed if I hadn't. And I don't remember hearing you complaining."

"Fair enough," he admitted, conceding the point. "Of course, I'll likely be sore for days, you realize. It's no easy feat, keeping up with you."

"Oh, please," Buffy rolled her eyes. "You were amazing, and you know it. Now stop fishing for compliments, and let me get dressed. I'll see you tonight."

"Tonight, then," Giles grinned, and Buffy closed the door as he turned to go. Making a mental note to stop by the pastry shop that afternoon, he passed a student on her way to the shower. Yawning and flexing an aching shoulder, Giles didn't notice the stunned look on her face. Nor did he catch the appraising look she gave him when he walked by.

Laney Douglas was floored. She may have only been half awake, but there was no mistaking the exchange she had just overheard. Not that she was eavesdropping, of course. But when some hot, older guy - who was clearly still wearing yesterday's clothes - came yawning his way out of a girl's room at 6:30 in the morning, grinning about being "up all night"...?

Unless Buffy and her handsome, British companion were members of some late-night sports league... sheyah, right... it was pretty obvious what was going on. As Laney made her way to the shower, she met Buffy coming out of her room and gave her a sly thumbs-up. She had to hand it to Buffy - the girl did a pretty good job of looking confused and innocent. But Laney wasn't fooled for a second.

What she heard in the bathroom only confirmed her suspicions. Apparently Buffy's roomie had just come back from her own "late night out", and the two girls made cryptic small talk about Buffy's date.

"Hey, was that Giles I saw leaving the dorm?"

"Yeah, late night kind of turned into early morning."

"So everything went okay last night?"

"Totally okay. And Giles was amazing."

"Well, duh."

"Seriously, Will, you should have seen him. I mean, I knew he had the Watching part down, but active participation? Definitely a plus."

Laney damn near choked on her toothpaste. This was too good not to share.

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

Willow nudged Buffy a couple times during Psych, but Riley, the TA, still noticed her momentary snooze. He gave her a conspiratorial smile, her lack of awakeness safe with him, and she redoubled her efforts to stay alert, picturing the gigantic mocha she was going to treat herself to when class was over. Fortunately for Buffy, Professor Walsh and Riley both got paged - probably some departmental thing - and class let out early, bringing her that much closer to caffeinated goodness.

Hushed whispers followed Buffy through the tiny space that UC Sunnydale insisted was a cafeteria, but after three years of people murmuring behind her back, she tuned it out as background noise. It wasn't until she noticed a few people actively leering that the whispering even registered. Then somebody pointed, and she definitely heard her name.

Buffy's shoulders sagged; she should have expected this. No way a user like Parker would let her humiliation stay private. Rumours of weirdness and weapons were one thing - that stuff was hardly her fault - but she was horrified at the thought of complete strangers knowing what an idiot she'd been to fall for Parker's routine. She turned and left, mocha long forgotten, and made her way back to the dorm. Her other classes would just have to manage without her for the day.

That evening, after a good, long cry and an even longer nap, Buffy was looking forward to patrolling with Giles. He was probably on his way over to pick her up already - and since when did she actually look forward to patrolling? A couple years ago maybe, when "patrol" was pretty much code for sneaking out of the house to make out with Angel, but she was surprised to realize that lately, it had become an honest-to-God highlight of her day. Buffy checked the mirror, satisfied to note the absence of any telltale puffiness around her eyes. Not that a little makeup would hurt... maybe do something with my hair... but she decided to take Willow's advice and mentally invite Parker to go straight to hell. Tonight, she was just going to enjoy being out with Giles.

Soon makeup, hair, and clothing had all passed inspection. Giles was due any minute, and the sudden flutter in her stomach was obviously hunger. There wasn't enough time to eat, so she settled for some juice. With a straw, of course. She didn't want to smudge her lip gloss. Because of the patrolling.

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

As Giles made his way through the lobby of Stevenson Hall, he noticed a pair of young women in the corner looking his way. One of them was vaguely familiar, and she seemed to be whispering animatedly to the girl next to her and pointing his way. Before he could wonder why, however, his attention was caught by a young man's voice coming from the stairs around the corner.

"Who, Buffy? Yeah, we had a thing," the boy said haughtily. "Girl's a total screamer." Giles felt his temper flare stopped, willing himself to count to ten. Not that it would help if his suspicions about what was likely to follow were correct.

Heedless of the danger just around the corner, Parker Abrams prattled on, eager to impress his assembled audience. "The word is flexibility. I swear the girl's, like, a gymnast or something. Totally worth a second dip if she wasn't so clingy. Heard she's givin' it up to some old guy now, which is fine with me. Already got myself a piece of that ass, and let me tell you..."

Riley Finn balled his fist, decidedly unimpressed and ready to knock Parker flat if he said so much as another word, but Parker's expression suddenly came over all gleeful. "Well, well," he smirked, "this must be the 'old guy' in question."

Riley followed Parker's gaze to the man who had just appeared behind them and relaxed his fist, convinced that Parker had just bitten off a whole lot more than he could chew. The man stepped forward into the circle, eyes gleaming cold, and if Parker had a second brain cell to rub against the one that worked his lips, he'd have kept his fool mouth shut. But the idiot was more than happy to dig his own grave.

"Gotta warn ya, Old Guy. Buffy spreads 'em pretty easy, but if you don't give her the cab fare up front she's just gonna—"

There was a wet, snapping sound, and blood came pouring from Parker's flattened nose. He moaned in agony, cursing as he crumpled to the stairs, and Giles crouched down next to him.

"On the other hand," he said menacingly, raising an open palm to the boy's profusely bleeding face, "I could have struck upwards, like this. Done correctly, the broken bone can actually pierce the brain." He paused a moment, relishing the stunned, scared look on the young man's ashen face before continuing. "Now, then. I believe you were saying something about Miss Summers?"

"Holy crap," Parker whimpered, trying valiantly not to wet himself. "T-these guys are witnesses, and—"

"I didn't see anything," Riley jumped in. "How about you guys?" He looked around at the others, who were more than willing to play along. Truthfully, Riley was disappointed to see that Buffy was obviously spoken for, but older guy or no, Buffy's boyfriend was pretty damn cool.

"Leave him to us, sir," Riley said. "We'll get him over to the clinic. Shame about that door he ran into."

"Oh, yeah," Graham volunteered. "Definitely a shame." He and Riley stepped forward to haul Parker to his feet. Giles pulled a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe the blood from his hand, giving the young men a grateful nod before turning to walk up the stairs.

Across the room, Laney Douglas gaped, open-mouthed.

Oh. My. God.