“I can’t believe mom fell asleep so fast.” Dawn complained, looking over the passenger seat into the back of the Jeep where Faith was lying.
They’d finally set off on their trip an hour and a half previously, after much fussing from Faith about leaving Baby Jack and from Spike about his now six months pregnant wife being so far from home.
Both Buffy and Angel had rolled their eyes at their spouses worrying, assuring them they would be fine without them for the next four days. Besides, they weren’t even leaving the state, the girls had decided on an extended weekend in San Francisco.
“Well she obviously needed it. Babies are hard work.” Buffy told her niece.
“Hey, you don’t need to tell me that. I’m the one who’s been kept awake for the past four months with his constant crying at night. I’m telling you Aunty B, you better enjoy the quiet nights while you still can.” Dawn had begun to use her mother’s nickname for her aunt.
“Hey I remember how annoying babies can be; your mom and I both still lived at home when she had you.”
“God did I make as much noise as Jack?”
Buffy smiled. “Actually you were a fairly quiet baby. I guess you’re making up for it now.”
“I can be quiet!” The teen complained, crossing her arms across her chest.
The blonde in the driving seat raised an eyebrow. Dawn ran her fingers over her mouth in a zipping gesture.
Exactly two minutes and twelve seconds passed before she opened her mouth.
“Tell me a story.” Dawn said, slouching lower in the passenger seat.
“Aren’t you a bit old for fairytales?” Buffy asked, not at all surprised by her niece’s lack of restrain.
“I mean a real story, about you and mom.”
Buffy thought for a moment. “Ok how about how your mom and I met Angel and your uncle Spike?”
“I already know that.” The teen whined. “It was at dad and Cordy’s wedding. I was there remember?”
“But I bet you don’t know the whole story. I mean, do you know how close you were to having Angel as your uncle and Spike as your step-dad?”
“What?!” The young brunette shouted, turning wide eyes on her aunt.
Buffy gave her a glare and checked the rear-view mirror to make sure Dawn’s outburst hadn’t woken Faith, who she knew was in desperate need of rest. But her sister remained in a deep slumber.
The blonde focused back on the road. “It’s not so hard to believe. I mean your mom and Spike are pretty alike, much more compatible than me and him.”
“It’s just weird to think of it, I can’t really see you with Angel. For one thing he’s way too tall for you!”
Buffy chuckled. “Well the way things turned out actually had a lot to do with you, so I guess I should thank you. But it also had to do with Spike’s boss and his old crappy car, and I so don’t want to show any kind of gratitude to Principal Snyder or the Desoto.”
“Me?” Dawn asked. “What did I do?”
“How about I start at the beginning?”
“Ok.” The teen said, fidgeting in her seat so find a more comfy position.
“Well as you know we all met at Xander’s wedding. While you were off with some of the other kids, your mom and I had done a lot of dancing and decided to have a rest. We’d just sat down when these two guys came over and asked if they could join us. So the four of us all started talking, and it wasn’t exactly clear who liked who. But then Spike announced be was heading out for a smoke and your mom decided to join him.”
“Mom smoked?” Dawn interjected.
“Yeah don’t you remember?” Buffy asked. “She gave up briefly when she had you, but started again when you were about two. I guess she never did it around you. It was Angel who actually made her stop permanently. I just wish I’d have been as successful with your uncle.”
“So what happened next?”
“While they were outside, Angel and I carried on chatting, and we seemed to get on really well. Then he asked me to dance which I accepted, and when Faith and Spike came back in, they started dancing together too.”
“I can’t believe I missed all this.”
“Well you were eight, and more interested in playing hide and seek and getting your bridesmaid dress dirty than paying attention to what your mom was up to.”
Buffy decided that being two hours into the journey; it would be a good time for a break and pulled into a gas station. After refilling the tank, aunt and niece used the bathrooms and purchased some snacks. Throughout, the brunette in the back seat remained sound asleep, despite the loud trunks and other noise.
After climbing back into the car, Buffy opened a bag of chips and placed it between herself and Dawn, grabbing a few as she pulled the car back onto the freeway.
“So when did the switch happen?” Dawn asked; keen to hear the rest of the story.
“Well at the end of the night we made a double date for the following weekend. But as the week went by, both your mom and me admitted to each other we were feeling unsure about our prospective boyfriends, feeling something wasn’t quite right. But we agreed to give them a chance. As I’m sure you’ll remember, I’d just broken up with Scott and was pretty much homeless, so had moved in with you guys temporarily until I found my own place.”
“Temporarily? You lived with us for six months, and then only moved out ‘cause you and Spike got married.”
Buffy scowled at her niece, but continued the tale. “On the Friday night Angel’s car pulled onto the drive at seven exactly, the time they’d said they’d pick us up, but he was alone. See Snyder, being the tiny, impotent Nazi with a bug up his butt the size of an emu that he is –”
Dawn interrupted, “nice imagery.”
“Thanks, I thought so.” Her aunt said. “Anyways, Snyde-man called an impromptu ‘urgent’ faculty meeting. It wasn’t really urgent, it was just that he’s a miserable little man with no social life, so wanted to wreck those of all of his staff by ruining their Friday nights.”
“You know I can’t believe he’s still the principal. He was there when you and mom were; he must be like a hundred by now. As cool as it’ll be having Spike teach me English and Giles as my librarian, I’m really dreading going to high school.”
“Hey you’ll be fine, just don’t mention your mom or me, or that your surname’s Summers. We weren’t exactly his favourite students. Use Harris instead. Although on second thoughts he never really liked your dad either. Best to go for Calendar. He’s never met Angel.”
Dawn’s eyes widened. “You really think he’ll hate me because of who my parents are?”
“Well he’s been making Spike’s life hell ever since he found out he’d married me.”
The teen looked even more worried.
Buffy put on a big smile. “Hey, don’t worry; you’ve still got a couple of years yet. Plenty of time for Snyder to get eaten by a giant snake or something.”
Her niece didn’t seem relived in the slightest by that possibility, so the blonde decided to change the subject and continue the story.
“Anyway, where was I? So Angel arrived alone but assured Faith that Spike wouldn’t be too much longer and was going to meet us at the restaurant. So when we got there we ordered some drinks and waited for him in the bar area. About ten minutes in Faith’s cell rang. It was your grandma; you were staying with her and your granddad for the night. She told your mom you’d fallen and were at the hospital.”
“I remember; gran and gramps had taken me to the playground and I fell from the jungle gym.”
“That’s right. Well we didn’t know how badly you were hurt and your mom became pretty hysterical. Angel offered to drive us straight to the hospital. But half way out to the car he remembered Spike was supposed to be meeting us. Well you know he refuses to get a cell phone – your uncle and technology are totally unmixy – so we had no way of telling him the change of plan. I offered to wait for him and get him to bring me to the hospital as soon as he arrived. Your dad was on his honeymoon but I knew Faith would be ok with mom and dad when she got there.”
Dawn took up the tale. “When she arrived I’d just come out of x-ray, it was the first time I’d seen mom cry.”
“Well Summers’ are strong; we don’t like to show emotion. When Spike arrived at the restaurant about twenty minutes later, I told him what had happened and we got in his car ready to come to the hospital. Only his crappy old car refused to start.”
“Don’t let him hear you say that. He loves his car.”
“Don’t I know it; I sometimes wonder if he loves it more than me.”
“Nah, you’re his number one. So what happened then?”
“Well I rang for a cab, then phoned your mom to let her know I’d be a while longer and to find out how you were. She said you were fine, you’d broken your arm and you were waiting to get it put in plaster, but you were just excited about everyone being able to sign your cast. She told me not to worry, to go straight home; you and she would be back soon. After hanging up I gave my cell to Spike so he could ring a mechanic. Well obviously they told him something he didn’t want to hear as he started shouting, you know how he gets.”
“I know, I sometimes wonder where he gets his impatience from; Giles is so calm and tolerant.”
Buffy scoffed. “Not in some of the stories I’ve heard about his youth.”
“Really?” Dawn asked, interest roused. “Like what?”
“That’s for another time; I’m already half way through a story. Unless of cause you’ve lost interest?”
“No, I wanna know how you ended up with Spike and mom with Angel.”
“Well like I said, Spike was yelling down the phone which wasn’t getting him anywhere, so I took the phone from him and calmly spoke to the guy. He said it’d be a while but he’d get there as soon as he could. Spike was clearly agitated, pacing backwards and forwards in front of his car. I didn’t really want to leave him alone, also worried what he might do to the mechanic when he did eventually turn up, so I rang and cancelled the cab.”
Buffy took a break to grab some more chips before continuing.
“Well it was getting cold so we sat and waited in his car listening to The Ramones, who I’d never heard of until that moment. He offered me his flask, which he told me contained Bourbon. I promptly screwed up my nose and went ‘ew’. ”
“Ok this isn’t exactly sounding like the most romantic story. I hope mom and Angel were fairing better.”
“Actually after the first few moments of awkwardness, we actually started to get on surprisingly well considering we’re so different. And you know what they say, opposites attract, and our attraction towards each other seemed to be growing fast. The time seemed to fly by and soon Spike admitted it was actually me who’d caught his eye first, but I seemed more taken with Angel and he figured he had more in common with Faith anyways. I told him that although I did like Angel, I hadn’t felt that ‘spark’, unlike how I was feeling with Spike now. He looked at me, taking a second to decide if he understood me right. From my smile he realised he had and just as he leaned over to kiss me the mechanic knocked on the window.”
“Talk about spoiling the moment.” Dawn said with an eye roll.
Buffy chuckled. “You can say that again. Anyway, the mechanic fixed the car pretty quickly and Spike of cause offered to drop me home. Well all the way back we were obviously worried about telling Faith and Angel about us, but it turns out there was no need to be; we pulled onto the drive to find them kissing each other goodnight on the porch after Angel had driven you two home from the hospital and Faith had put you to bed.”
“So everything turned out ok in the end?”
“Well we made them sweat for a while, let them apologise for ‘breaking our hearts’. But you know your Uncle; he can’t keep anything to himself. He burst out laughing before pulling me into him and kissing me soundly and the truth was out.”
“Wow, that’s really great, but kinda weird. I’m glad everything worked out the way it did.”
“Me too.” The blonde smiled as she finished up the last of the chips.
Suddenly, Buffy grabbed Dawns hand and placed it on her swollen stomach.
“He’s kicking.”
Dawns eyes widened as she felt the movement. “Oh my god that’s so cool. He’s way stronger than Jack ever was in mom.”
“Aw, I can’t believe it’s the first time he’s moved and Spike missed it. He’s gonna be so disappointed. Especially seeing how he didn’t want me to leave in the first place.” The blonde complained.
“Well I’m sure it won’t be the last time. When it happens when he’s with you, just pretend that’s the first time.” The teen advised her.
“Sneaky, I like it.” Buffy said with narrowed eyes. “Yep, Principal Snyder best be prepared for another Summers girl.”
********
An hour later, Faith finally stirred, just as Buffy pulled into the hotels parking lot.
“Whoa, we’re here? How long have I been asleep? Why didn’t you wake me?” The brunette asked. “I said I’d drive half the way.”
“You just look so cute when you’re sleeping. And I know you must have needed it.” The blonde told her.
After pulling their cases from the trunk, the trio entered the hotel.
“Besides, now you get to drive and be story-master on the way home.”
“Story-master?” Faith asked with a raised brow.
“I’ll let your daughter explain.” Her sister said and Buffy made her way over to check in.
Dawn immediately turned accusing eyes on her mother. “You smoked? When you’re always telling me how wrong it is?”
“What…how...I…” Faith tried to respond, before turning wide eyes on Buffy as she came back over to them with their room keys. “You told her I smoked?”
“Hey, I never forced the cancer causing sticks in your mouth.” Buffy told her innocently. “Don’t do the crime if you can’t stand disapproving offspring.”
********
The trip was just what all three girls needed. They were pampered and preened in the hotels beauty salon and spa, shopped in the many malls of San Francisco, and ate exactly what they wanted when they wanted. In Dawn’s case this was usually ice cream, and Buffy had been getting some very strange cravings; room service had been baffled by the requests until the blonde had explained her condition. Fortunately Faith, unable to shake ‘mom mode’ completely, made sure they all ate at least one nutritious meal a day.
As they pulled up onto Faith’s driveway on the Monday evening feeling totally relaxed and revitalised, they found a welcoming party made up of two smiling husbands and a four month old baby.
While Faith was straight out of the car and making a fuss over little Jack, Buffy had barley put out a foot when Spike swooped her up in his arms. “You’re never leaving again.” He whispered into her hair.
“Aww honey I was only gone for three nights.”
“It was long enough. Peaches has been driving me round the bloody bend.”
Buffy pouted. “And here I was thinking it was because you’d missed me.”
“Well, that to.” He told her with a smirk before placing a hand over her stomach. “And how’s little Willy doing?”
“Billy is fine. Been quiet all weekend.” Buffy told him, sharing a secretive smile with Dawn. Spike was too preoccupied with her bump to notice.
After their last scan they’d found out the baby was a boy and had taken to referring to him as William jnr until they could decide on something else. Spike used the acronym Willy, much to Buffy's dismay, who chose to use the more inoffensive abbreviation of Billy or Will.
“Well I dunno about you guys but I’m beat.” Dawn told the adults. “I’m gonna head up to bed.” She exchanged goodnights with them all, first her Mom and Angel, then Buffy thanking her for the trip, then finally Spike.
“Night daddy.” The teen said as she hugged the peroxide blond, sharing one last smirk with her aunt; this one less secretive, and headed up the porch steps and into the house.
Spike, Faith and Angel all looked to Buffy in question; whose face transformed into a picture of innocence. “Why is everyone looking at me?”
squawks
05/18/17 04:16 am
pj! I remember wishing one of your stories would be finished seriously about a decade ago. Amazing. I just tried an old password I used to use and amazingly got in too. Memories!
pj
03/20/17 01:20 am
10 yrs later, i finally rem my username and password. Pari, you rock. Hope you are well.
Rabbit_moon1
12/23/16 01:12 pm
I donate every month. Please donate to keep this site up!
AudryDaluz1
10/06/16 08:34 am
Great post.
Chrissel
08/31/16 03:45 pm
And anyone else who loves this site, it's worth mentioning there's a nifty little "Donate" option just below the shout box here! ;)
Chrissel
08/31/16 03:43 pm
Just wanted to take a moment to thank Pari and all the mods for maintaining such a great site!
05/18/17 04:16 am
pj! I remember wishing one of your stories would be finished seriously about a decade ago. Amazing. I just tried an old password I used to use and amazingly got in too. Memories!
pj
03/20/17 01:20 am
10 yrs later, i finally rem my username and password. Pari, you rock. Hope you are well.
Rabbit_moon1
12/23/16 01:12 pm
I donate every month. Please donate to keep this site up!
AudryDaluz1
10/06/16 08:34 am
Great post.
Chrissel
08/31/16 03:45 pm
And anyone else who loves this site, it's worth mentioning there's a nifty little "Donate" option just below the shout box here! ;)
Chrissel
08/31/16 03:43 pm
Just wanted to take a moment to thank Pari and all the mods for maintaining such a great site!