Dawn's older sister (aka She-who-shall-not-be-named because 'she' is hormonal/raging biotch) had the coolest job description EVER. Not just in Dawn's short history on this very small, environmentally-unhealthy planet, nuh uh, oh no.
EVER.
Didn't mean her sister wasn't still tragically frigid. We're talking MAJOR Ice Queen issues.
Her sister fought the forces of darkness and evil and those in pleather pants and God-so-5-years-ago clog boots! She was a bona fide "World Saver", several times over, and even had a few wooden, glittery plaques made by Xander to prove it.
How was this not the coolest thing ever?!
Trust Dawn's sister to take the whole 'Check it out, I'm a superhero!' thing for granted, twisting it to make it look like some life-sucking, popularity-killing responsibility instead.
There were some things about she-who-shall-not-be-named, Dawn supposed, that didn't have her sister falling under the 'depressingly lame' side of life. Take, for instance, Dawn's current surroundings.
Dusty. Dirty. Pathetic lack of furniture and decor. Dark and dismal and really, really kinda cool.
In other words: the most perfect place to hang out and chill.
Dreamily, Dawn peered up from her carefully chosen spot in the corner of the crypt to stare at Spike. He was sitting on one arm of some nasty-looking green chair, her mom perched on the other (and how lame was THAT?), both of them bonding like demented schoolgirls over some stupid cheesy soap opera.
If Spike wasn't so hot, she'd probably have, like, zero respect for him.
But he was. Hot. And also a vampire. Hence the fact that her sister wasn't a TOTAL loser, because leaving Dawn in the very, veeeeery nice and way capable hands of Spike? Well... simply put... yay!
She'd always thought Spike to be on a different, more cooler level than her older sister's last vampire boyfriend. Angel. Eccch. Say that name without major retch-reflexes. But ever since she could remember, Dawn's sister had always been all, "Oh no, Spike's evil! Unrepentantly so! He wears that evil leather coat and smokes those stinky evil cigarettes! And wears ugly evil boots!" Yeah, well. So? Who says all that isn't just a supreme lack of fashion sense? Who says maybe Spike's not just color blind?! Dawn's sister didn't know! Just because Spike had, at one point or another in time, tried to pick off and kill almost everybody Dawn knew... it didn't make him evil!
Or still, anyway.
Vampire's can change. Vampire's can reform. Heck, she'd caught that show and its made-for-TV-move with Angel, didn't she?
Careful not to make any noise, Dawn started to stir. She was beyond bored and her left leg had fallen asleep from the many quiet, possibly spell-altered-to-make-them-seem-even-longer minutes of sitting Indian style.
"So," she heard her mom say as she was climbing to her feet, in this breathless, higher-than-normal voice that made Dawn want to gag, "How long have you been a fan of the show?" The sentence was ended with a weird, forced laugh--one that sounded suspiciously like a giggle. Too gross to even further elaborate.
"Oh, you know. Few months. I came across it after Dru dumped me--" There was this short, awkward pause, before Spike felt the need to add, "That's my ex. Drusilla." Then another pause. "You two ever... you know..."
Her mom, with an accompanied sort of gasp, filled in, "Meet? Oh, no!" She laughed that breathy laugh again. "Although, I think I can recall hearing you talk about her."
A quirk of the eyebrow on Spike's part. "Oh, yeah?"
"There may have been hot chocolate involved."
GOD, Dawn mentally huffed. Could her mom sound more pathetic?! Besides, HELLO. Spike's, like, way not into the creepy Mrs. Robinson vibe. Probably. Well, Dawn just naturally assumed. A guy that model-ishly good-looking and into the whole leather/complete Bad Ass-vibe? Yeah, so not going for the Mommy Dearest/Housewife thing. He probably liked his women younger...
"Ohhh," Spike was saying in remembrance, in this weirdly rumbly sounding voice. "Right." There was a smile in his voice, as well as on his face. "I nearly forgot about that, what with your eldest since making it a habit to try and kill me and all." He leaned to the side, which just so happened to be in the direction of her mom, wearing a look that was suspiciously close to resembling a leer. "Nice to know at least one of the Summers' women doesn't have it in for me."
Dawn was royally offended. Hello, see her over here? See this pink backpack? It's not just floating in the air! Actual alive girl here!
"Well," her mom said, with a shy, flattered duck of her head. "You know how Buffy is." She lowered her voice to this conspirative level, all but forgetting that her other daughter was still present and accounted for in the same very room. "Stubborn as a mule. And she's always been that way, not just since she became the Slayer." She said the word 'Slayer' so discreetly, so secretly--so proudly. Like one of them soccer mom's happily displaying all twelve of her daughter's 'straight A' bumper stickers on the rear end of her mini-van.
Spike's attention was no longer on the TV set in front of him. Instead, he'd leaned back, his arms rested coolly across his chest. "Is that right," he said, again in that rumbly, growly kinda voice. His eyes flared playfully, this spark dancing in all the blue. "And what else has Buffy always been like?"
Dawn seriously couldn't take another word. It's bad enough her mom was waving some figurative "#1 fan" flag, but Spike too? Please, if he knew how much she-who-shall-not-be-named really hated him, there's no way he'd even care what she-who-shall-not-be-named was like.
Besides, Dawn could tell Spike was she was like! Bossy, annoying, a lost fashion victim to the snap-bracelet craze...
In an attempt to appear casual and not the least bit interested in the gossip-duo that was her mom and Spike, Dawn decided to take a self-led tour of Spike's less-than-humble home. She'd never been in a crypt before, not one that was actually fixed up like this with, you know, people stuff, and it all was kinda... neat. In its own way. If you ignored that humongous spider web just above her head and to the right.
Dawn quickly directed herself elsewhere.
There was a refrigerator. She was instantly interested in opening it up and shuffling through whatever contents were in there. Spike mentioned blood before, but... he didn't really drink that stuff, did he? That's got to be one of them stupid myths they tell gullible kids to freak them out and get them to behave. Like the whole 'Santa Clause' shtick. Pretentiously unbelievable.
"She never used to stay asleep when I put her to bed," her mom's voice fluttered towards her, in that maternal, glowy voice that made Dawn want to puke. "She'd always get right back up, this mean little glower on her face that was more adorable than scary, and tell Hank and I--that's her father--'I'm not sleeping, and you can't make me!'" She laughed, one of her hands grabbing Spike's forearm in that touchy way women always seemed to do. "Can you believe it? My four-year old daughter, the rebel."
Ugh.
Dawn stormed off to the right, determined to mentally bleach this conversation from her head. When she told Janice all about it--and she would, later, over a pint of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream with some kinda Leonardo DiCaprio movie on as visual inspiration in the background--she'd completely erase her mom's presence. Less lame like that. I mean, who wants to start off their conversation with, "Yeah, so me and my mom were dumped by Her Royal Biotch-ness at this guy Spike's crypt"?
Ohh, boxes! Dawn, being one in tune with her inner-Harriet the Spy, found herself drawn to whatever lay inside of them. It wasn't being nosey, she mentally assured herself, not really. Besides, it was like open invitation here. Spike obviously wasn't being a very thoughtful host, so she'd have to entertain herself, wouldn't she?
Point made.
The first thing that caught her eye was something pink and fuzzy. On further inspection it turned out to be a shirt. If you could even call the very small piece of sheer, stretchy fabric that. Dawn picked it up by the tips of her finger, not wanting to touch something that could possibly contain diseases. She had a very vague memory of seeing Spike and some sleazy-looking blonde girl together a few months ago.
Oh! Maybe this was like the Ex Box? You know, you dump somebody and, so, being that you're totally over them, you throw together a box of all their stuff that you never want to see again?
Wow. Spike had an Ex Box. How... normal. And a little girly.
She pulled herself closer, interested beyond belief. She was practically bubbling with excitement. At least this entire night wouldn't be spent as some forgotten fly on the wall. Hmm. She leafed through several garments. Ugly and shiny gold blouse... a purple headband that was so last spring... some.... EWW! Underwear... gross! She bypassed that article of supposed clothing completely. To its side (and, seriously, how could those thing even COVER anything? They looked like dental floss!) was a light brown sweater that looked strangely familiar. Maybe this was what she'd seen that blonde ho-bag in? Maybe...
Dawn inched past that box, moving onto the next--or so she was in the process of, until something else caught her eye. A blonde wig, to be exact. There was an automatic visual that popped into her head--Spike wearing the wig. That elicited a small giggle, one that she quickly concealed. Laughing at the Big Bad would probably make her look desperate, in that cheerleader/airhead type way. No good. Only... this blonde wigged was already attached to a body... or... a fake one, at least.
It took Dawn a few blinks but once the disbelief cleared, she noticed a slight... resemblance... in the blonde-haired mannequin. It looked almost like...
Dawn's vision swung to the right.
Spike was completely submersed in whatever stories her mom was still happily giving.
Her vision swept back to the left.
There's... no way.
I mean, c'mon.
It'd have to be, like, one colossal case of twisted reality. Like, to 'freak of nature' degrees.
But...
Dawn squinted. Shuffled forward a few steps.
Even the shirt the mannequin was wearing was familiar, in a 'I've totally been accused of stealing that in the past!' way. The blonde wig... the plain face... and, okay, the fact that even the mannequin was completely flat chested...
"Spike...." she hesitantly started, her eyes unbelievably glued to the one spot.
She was met with silence, which, any other situation, would've annoyed her. Now she was completely unfazed by it. I mean, it just further added to her growing collection of proof that Spike was totally and completely in love with...
Ew, she couldn't even finish that thought.
Dawn leant forward, one dainty finger poking through the box placed just a smidge to the left of the mannequin. Oh, suspicion definitely confirmed. There were drawings and pictures and even more pieces of clothing that she could've swore had at some not-too-short time ago been hanging in her sister's closet.
She took one step back. Besides the fact that the mannequin was really kinda creepy, this was... this was almost like a boxed up version of a shrine.
"Spike..." she tried again. There was a slight warble in her voice, but, she convinced herself, it was probably due to the exertion of wanting to give Spike the benefit of the doubt. Maybe if he explained himself, this all would make sense.
He peered around her mom, his eyes all squinty. "Yeah?"
"What, uh, is? This?" She toed a box with her left foot.
"What are you on about?"
"This!" Okay, so her voice may have reached very shrill levels there, and the mannequin and its creepy sidekick collection of Buffy-wear might've toppled over with that increase in dramatics, but still! Normal is the watchword.
Her mom lurched to her feet the same time Spike had sprung to his.
"I can explain," he quickly started, hands already in the air in some placating, 'innocent until proven guilty' position.
"Dawn," her mom said, stepping hesitantly towards the dysfunction-o-rama that was splayed all over the floor.
"It's not what it looks like," Spike tacked on uselessly.
"Oh, please!" Dawn retorted. She'd finally met his eyes at that, but he was watching her mom.
"Now, alright. Here's the thing--"
"Is that..." her mom cut him off, her voice sounding very far away.
"She's always been a bleeding menace! Always around--"
"Oh my god."
"Don't go reading into things, alright? I mean, vampire here--"
"You have a life-size Buffy doll!" Dawn laughed, because, while horrifying, it still was pretty funny. In that 'my life cosmically sucks' way, but, still. Points for absolute absurdity, at least.
"Okay, point--"
Just then, the crypt door burst open, startling everyone. It was like a scene out of one of them old Western movies, only instead of a grungy, unshaved cowboy strolling through with a horse tagging along, it was just her sister.
"Hey, guys," Buffy said, pleasant as can be--completely oblivious to the inch-thick tension in the air. "What's up?"
And Dawn just smiled.
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!