Chapter 1: We were both young
“Buffy!” Joyce Summers-Giles yelled up the stairs from the first floor of her home of 5 years. “It’s time to wake up, Rupert made pancakes so you better hurry before they get eaten by Dawn.”
Buffy’s eyes opened much to a protest from her whole body. The sun, like every morning where it filtered through her window, seemed to be the light created by the devil itself this morning. She groaned rolling over desperately trying to pull the pillow over her head. Having some vain hope that if she could just slip back into sleep she still wouldn’t have to wake up. That she could go back into dreamland.
It was the truth that Buffy was everything except a morning person. It took much tugging and pulling from her family to rip her out of her comfy full sized bed and force her to the bathroom. To the outside observer, watching Buffy’s mother pry Buffy from her bed by her feet while the teen held onto the slats of her headboard for dear life, was quite comical. Yet almost every morning she came out gleaming and sparkly ready for the day much to her little sister’s jealousy at how she could look so good with little effort.
Speaking of her little sister, Dawn, the product of Buffy’s mother and stepfather’s marriage barged into her room with only a brief knock. She made her presence known by the stomping of her feet and the door banging against the wall of Buffy’s bedroom. Buffy could only omit a groan which she prayed would clue her little sister by five years to get out of her room.
“Buffy! Do you think I can barrow that yellow floral print skirt for school today? I promise I won’t spill anything on it, its just Connor had actually taken notice when I wore a skirt and you always told me that yellow was a flattering color for me.” Buffy’s 13 year-old sister didn’t take notice of the Buffy shaped lump under Buffy’s blankets, continuing her rambling even though her sister was probably counting backwards from ten to keep herself from hurling a pillow at Dawn.
“Buffy, I thought I told you to get up. Rise and shine honey, we don’t want you to be late for school.” Joyce’s voice broke the shield of Buffy’s pillow. She had come upstairs to check and confirm if Buffy had yet to get up, and like always her eldest daughter still had yet to move. “Xander might show up and you won’t even be ready and then you’ll make the poor boy wait.”
“UGH!!!!” Buffy’s voice, croaky due to just having woken up popped an eye open and spied over at where her mother and sister stood.
“Don’t you groan at me young lady. Up and at ‘em. Else I’ll be dumping water on you again.” Joyce walked out of the room leaving Dawn to await the awakening of her older half sister.
“Alright! God! I’m up.” Buffy declared as she threw her bed sheets off her and slowly slid her body from the mattress. She ignored Dawn’s snicker at what she was guessing the haphazard mess of her hair, instead getting up and walking to her bathroom. She disregarded Dawn’s presence all together, as she shut the door she door she heard her sister’s annoyed protest.
Thirty minutes later, Buffy emerged from the bathroom; fully awake showered and hair blown dry. A billow of shower steam wafted out of the bathroom after her as she made her way to her closet, the towel wrapped tight around her form. She noticed the door of her closet open and an empty hanger. She rolled her eyes guessing Dawn had gotten tired of waiting and had instead raided her closet.
Buffy was a typical teenage girl, that did make a concerned effort with her looks but she wasn’t the type of girl that spent a long time in front of her closet trying to decide on what to wear, that she left up to one of her good friends Cordelia. So like every morning Buffy picked an outfit quickly deciding on a pair of jeans, and a nice tank top since the weather was still warm and hadn’t yet settled on colder autumn weather. After dressing she made her way to her vanity running a flat iron through her golden blonde hair, before applying a good, but minimal amount of make-up. Buffy was one of those natural beauty types of girls. The most make-up she ever wore was usually for a night out or to a dance. But most school days she kept it to light eye-makeup and pinky gloss.
17 year-old Buffy Summers could hear the hustle and bustle of her household going on downstairs. Dawn’s chatter to their parents made their way up to Buffy’s ears on the second floor which reminded the blonde teenager that her stepfather had made his ultimately yummy pancakes this morning and the longer she stood upstairs the more time Dawn had to horn in on her share.
Grabbing her book bag, Buffy left her room and hopped downstairs where she greeted her family like every morning with a cheery hello, walking over she gave a kiss to her stepfather Giles’ - as she had grown to call him- cheek. Occasionally Buffy would call him her dad, but it was just out of habit to call him by his last name. It was never out of the fact because she didn’t see him as her father, quite the contrary. Buffy had accepted Rupert Giles, who stood at the sink washing the pots and pans from his breakfast making, to be more of a father to her than her biological one would ever be.
“Please tell me you saved me a plate before giving the rest to Dawn?” Buffy pleaded. Dawn let out a weak guttural mouthful protest from her spot at the counter, but it went ignored.
Rupert smiled down at his stepdaughter, a girl he saw as his own, and pulled a plate from beside him of warm fluffy pancakes and handed it to Buffy. She squealed with delight and came to sit at the counter next to Dawn swiping the syrup up like it was a prize.
Joyce came in a few minutes later, walking and still trying to put her earrings on. She leaned over to kiss her husband of 14 years good morning, and Buffy watched with admiration at the love they shared.
Buffy’s mother had once been married to Buffy’s biological father, but once Buffy had been born the relationship had turned sour. Her father had turned into a man with a wandering eye and Joyce Summers left her bastard of a husband just shy of Buffy’s third birthday. Enter Rupert Giles, a man who had met Joyce at a Los Angeles Public Library, which at the time he ran. Joyce had been taking little Buffy there every weekend picking out books for them to read and integrate Buffy in the habit of loving knowledge. A relationship had blossomed and soon a year and a half later they were married and had been happy ever since.
Giles had never tried to replace her father, which Buffy still occasionally saw every other year for certain holidays and whenever he made his way through town. However as Buffy got older visits became less and less. Now Buffy was lucky to get a phone call or a gift from her estranged father. She didn’t mind though, because ever since the young age when Buffy’s mother had married Giles, the man had treated her like his own.
And here, they lived happily in Sunnydale, after having moved here for a job opportunity with Joyce, nearly five years ago. Her mother ran her own art gallery one that was currently thriving and business was booming as someone would say. Rupert had taken up a job as the local high school librarian but after an offer from UC Sunnydale a couple years ago, he took a position as a faculty member in the admissions office.
Life was good, Buffy observed as she shoved a mouthful of pancakes into her mouth. Nothing could be better.
“Okay Buffy, now you said something about your counselor wanting to speak with you after school today?” Joyce asked as she sipped on her coffee.
Buffy nodded but waited until her mouth was clear before she spoke. “Yeah she thinks something is wrong since I’m not doing cheerleading this year.” Buffy shrugged. “Possibly putting some thought in her head that something is wrong at home…”
“How come you didn’t continue cheering Buff?” Dawn asked looking over at her older sister.
The teen could only shrug her shoulders. “Lost interest I guess. Figured its my senior year, I don’t want to be run down with practice when I really need to focus on making sure I get good enough grades for school.”
“But your grades were always really well before when you did cheerleading, my dear.” Giles stated as he wiped his hands dry with a dishtowel.
“Which was always a surprise to the whole squad and half the school that a cheerleader could get a decent grade.” Buffy said with a chuckle before she quickly took her last bite of her breakfast. “I guess I just want something new. I was a cheerleader for three years. Nothing really changes except maybe the outcomes of the games we cheer for.”
“Well as long as you’re happy sweetie.” Joyce assured her daughter with a smile. Buffy nodded her head and got up to put her plate in the sink. Suddenly a loud honk was heard from the street signaling to Buffy that her ride had arrived. “OH! There’s Xander, I better get going, don’t want to make Willow wait for us to pick her up.”
Buffy made her rounds of kissing everyone goodbye. She mussed up Dawn’s hair as she passed by, yelling she’d see them all later as she went out the door.
Sunnydale High. The epitome of every teenager's hate towards the world. It started after the first week of the child’s freshmen year, when the dazzling idea of beginning high school had worn off. The loathing wouldn’t end until well after they had flipped the bird to campus come gradation.
But until then, for five days a week, with ten months a year, of a four-year sentence the students of Sunnydale High would endure trekking it through the halls, sitting through listless and boring lectures and endure food that not even convicts would eat in jail.
Xander pulled the 57’ Chevy Bel Air into empty parking spot in the overly crowded Sunnydale High Student parking lot. The goofy brunette killed the engine and hopped out of the car through the top rather than using the door. He quickly turned to make sure there were no scuff marks on the door, admiring his prized possession. Xander had happily taken the car after his Uncle Rory’s licensed was finally suspended for too many DUI’s, which Xander claimed he thought of the car as a way to get the ladies. So far the only women that had gotten in the car since Xander had begun driving it at the beginning of the school year were Buffy and Willow who were currently exiting the car properly, via opening the door.
Buffy pulled the front seat forward allowing Willow to climb out before she closed the door and looked at her red headed best friend.
“I’m really not looking forward to this chem test today.” Buffy declared, her eyebrows scrunching up over the frames of the sunglasses that adorned her face. Buffy Summers from the first sight of her, was the clichéd California girl. Her bottle blonde hair, trendy clothes, and perky cheerleader social butterfly personality. Truly though, Buffy didn’t live up to the ditzy stereotype. She cared for her grades, which made her admired even more by those that attended Sunnydale High.
While she was associated with those that were higher up in the food chain of popularity it was mainly because she had been both captain of the JV and Varsity cheerleading squad. She hadn’t been like most to ditch her ‘uncool’ friends as others saw Buffy’s group the second she had gotten into high school and been incorporated into the cheerleading squad. Not even when she had dated Riley Finn, captain of the football team, her sophomore year. Xander, Willow, and the rest of their friends kept her grounded and focused on the fact that life was bigger than high school popularity. They had all been friends since Buffy had moved to Sunnydale, they made her feel comfortable, why on earth would she leave them?
While most would think so, Buffy would disagree that she was the golden girl. She was what the boys strived for in the kind of gal they wanted and the girls envied to be a lot like her. She was the reason that Sunnydale High rarely ever had problems between cliques due to differences.
“You’re not looking forward to it?” Xander asked grabbing his backpack from the back seat. He stared at Buffy with disbelief. “At least you and Willow studied for it.”
Willow put on her famous resolve face and looked at her best friend since Kindergarten. “Don’t even Alexander Harris! You know you could have come over to Buffy’s to study but no, you wanted to go play pool with Oz.”
As always Daniel ‘Oz’ Osbourne popped out of nowhere stepping up to Willow and wrapping his arm around her quietly.
“How come you’re not yelling at him for not studying?” Xander pointed out defensively.
“Because Oz does super fantastic on tests. Lucky bastard.” Buffy muttered. Oz just shrugged his shoulders with a smile before leaning over to give Willow a greeting kiss. Buffy had grown accustomed to Willow’s boyfriend’s lack of speech. It had taken awhile when he and Willow had first begun to see each other the year before but he showed he could somehow fit well in the group.
“Where’s Faith?” Willow asked looking around the parking lot trying to find the missing member of their group. Suddenly tires screeched as a car pulled into the parking lot like a bat shot out of hell. It whipped around the corner of the parking row that they were all standing in and came to a harsh stop into the miraculously empty stall next to Xander’s Bel Air. “Oh there she is!” Willow giggled as the driver’s door opened of the 67’ Mustang ‘Shelby’ GT500 and a puff cloud of smoke billowed out followed by the wild child brunette, Faith.
Faith Lehane stomped her cigarette out before grabbing the schoolbooks on the passenger seat and closing the door of her completely restored car and walking over to her friends. She ignored the drools of some of the guys that stared at her car. She had bought it a year ago when at the time it was completely a piece of junk and had no engine. She had spent nearly four months working to restore it to it’s better than original condition with a few perks that she added. Faith Lehane was a woman that wasn’t known to follow the normal rules girls followed. She worked at her father’s auto repair shop and knew more about cars than a lot of the guys that always stared at her beautiful car.
“Hello all!” Faith announced as she came to stand next to Buffy who was always Faith’s preferred member of the group.
The two worked well together; well beyond expected for as much as they were different. Where Buffy was light and sweet, Faith was dark and harsh. It showed through both their personality and looks, yet they got along so well. Faith claimed it to the fact that Buffy, or ‘B’ as she always referred to the blonde, didn’t make her want to gag when she thought of Buffy as a cheerleader. Again she respected Buffy on the fact that she didn’t act an airhead.
“Morning Faith!” Everyone except Oz said with excitement.
“So are we hitting the Bronze tonight? I feel a major need to let loose after today…” Buffy declared as the group began making it’s way to the school’s entrance to begin their day.
“I’m down for some bumping and grinding B, as long as I can get the grease off of me.” Faith responded as she bumped hips with Buffy.
“You know you’ll do great on the chemistry test, Buffy.” Willow assured.
Buffy looked at her quizzically but shrugged it off with a laugh. “Yeah and I’ll also meet the man of my dreams today.”
“Rayne?!? Did you finish that tune up on that Cadillac?”
“Yeah, about four bloody hours ago!”
William Rayne, or as many that knew him well, Spike, pushed himself so that he rolled out from under the car that he was currently working on. He stared up at his boss, owner of the shop that he had worked in for nearly two years, as he wiped the oil that begun to leak onto his form fitting white shirt, which was already covered in different areas with grease from his other work.
“That’s why I hired you Rayne, good speedy worker. Just like my Faith!” Spike’s boss, Dante turned around and headed back to the service window where the owner of the Black Cadillac stood waiting for their now completely tuned up car.
“Talking about lil’ ol me?” Faith said as she sauntered into the mechanics garage shop. She received a few cat calls as always from a few of the other shop workers. Simply licking her lips at them to aggravate their raging libidos further. Spike craned his neck and watched his boss’ daughter, come to stand next to the car that he was currently working on.
“Speaking of the hell on wheels…” Spike said pushing himself to roll back under the car. “What’s up, love?”
“Oh you know…turning necks, creating chaos-“
“Breaking hearts?” Spike asked interrupting her as he tried to tighten the valve that he had just replaced earlier.
Faith shrugged, kicking the work floor with her boot. “Isn’t a good day if I don’t.”
Spike chuckled at the pure jailbait that was his boss’ daughter. She was exactly as he had referred to her. ‘Hell on wheels’. Walking sin since she was 14 and had found the ability to ploy good old Dad’s credit card to buy clothes that only brought more attention to the early-blossomed assets that she held physically.
He had come across Faith purely on accident when he first started working for Dante Lehane. She had been moseying around the dive that was could be considered a bar having flirted her way in. She had attempted to hit on Spike but when no sexual reaction came from him they had found the shared interest in anything on wheels. Bikes…cars…talking all they could about what ranked top. Since then it was purely a friendship especially when Spike later found out the next day that she was his boss’s daughter and was only 16 at the time.
As Spike referred to her constantly, her weapon of sexual appeal, would make the Pope denounce his vows. She knew how to work it, just as much as she knew how to fix most of the cars that came through the garage’s door.
Though Spike purely saw her as a friend, a kid sister at that. She had weaseled her way into his heart, one of the very few, and the same was for Faith towards him.
“Billy…what do we have in the shop today?” Faith asked as she pulled her long brown hair up into a high pony tail and walking over to the slew of lockers in the corner of the garage, pulling on a set of mechanics coveralls.
“Busted timing belt on a BMW over in the back, the others haven’t found the chance to pull it up apparently” Spike spoke loudly referring to the others that stood around in a circle. Taking one of many breaks.
As Faith tossed one of the guys a set of keys to pull the BMW around, she assessed the car that Spike was working on himself. “You know Billy it is quite a turn on to see a man working it like you do with a car.” Faith teased purely out of humor.
“Don’t I bloody know it.” Spike said matter of factly. He slid out from under the car, getting up and shutting the hood, finally done with the car. He threw a smirk at Faith before reaching out to rustle her hair as if she was his kid sister. She scoffed trying to doge his hands covered in grease.
“Asshole.”
“Bitch.” Spike threw back walking over to his water bottle.
“Shit head.”
“Tease.”
“If only that were true.” Faith said cracking up. Spike shook his head choosing not to hear about his boss’s daughter’s escapades.
A whole hour had passed where everyone was too focused on his or her work that barely any conversation was exchanged. After working diligently on the broken timing belt and the damage it had done to the whole engine from when it had snapped, Faith stood and stretched her muscles; arms rising above her head before letting a satisfied sigh escape her lips.
Spike also taking a moment to pull himself out from under the new car he was working on, stood to grab water from the gallon jug on his dedicated work bench. He looked into the office window and spied a customer that Dante was filling out paperwork for, hungrily stare at Faith as she tended to her tight muscles. Her father looked up noticing the customers drooling and shouted to drive the customers’ attention from staring at his daughter. Spike could only chuckle, it was a wonder that Dante didn’t strangle himself or his daughter from the stress her behavior and attention drawing brought him.
Faith wiggled over to the sound system and cranked it up to a classic rock radio station. Approving cheers were heard from others while they continued to work and Faith, feeling the music hopped and shimmed back over to her current project. She lip-synced the lyrics, winking at Spike as he simply rolled his eyes in amusement.
“Any plans tonight for you Billy?”
“Looks like I’m going to be getting some drinks with some ol’mates tonight.”
Spike hadn’t planned on going out tonight but when Angelus and Gunn had called him saying they were had finalized their move from Los Angeles and would be in town this afternoon they had insisted on going out for celebratory drinks at the three being re-united again.
After graduating high school, Spike had left the hell town known as Sunnydale and lived in Los Angeles for a while. He had met both Angelus and Gunn at a club that he was working as a bouncer at. Angelus and Gunn were both business majors at UCLA and Spike had taken a liking to them because they weren’t like a lot of the other snobby college kids that frequented the club he worked at. Even after Spike had ended up moving back to Sunnydale two years later after his twentieth birthday the three of them stayed good mates and visited once in awhile.
Now the two had been hired at a local start up corporation that was basing itself in Sunnydale and been happy to move to the small town and away from the busy streets of L.A.
“Fish Tank, Bronze, or Willy’s?” Faith asked. Although she was scraping the end of seventeen, Faith knew all the bars well in town. She had her ways of getting in. Ways Spike was sure her father would take his shotgun out for.
“Bronze.” Spike answered. “Creating more mayhem tonight on the town?”
“Civilized and square fun. I’ve been roped into attending the good ol’Bronze with the Sunny-D High group.” She sauntered over to him and leaned in real close. “Save me a dance Billy?”
She laughed when he swatted her away like a fly in jest. “Darlin’ you wouldn’t be able to keep up with me.”