A Kick From Champagne
 Parts 1-3


Written by: Pattyanne
 Author's Website





Summary: Buffy has too much to drink one rainy night, then Spike shows up. After an overdose of angst last season, I had to do something kind of silly. This is sort of early season 6.
Disclaimer: The show Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all of it's characters belong to Joss, Mutant Enemy, & Fox Prod.
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Part One...


"Three hundred and sixty four days of drought," Buffy grumbled as she struggled to get the door unlocked while balancing a grocery bag, her purse, the dry cleaning, the mail, and her favorite leather jacket. "Now, I gotta build an ark."

When she'd left to run her errands, the sky had been a little cloudy, but she hadn't expected it to rain.

*<*I have got to pick up a newspaper once in a while.*>*

She dropped her load on the kitchen table and examined her jacket for water damage, swearing under her breath, using words her mother would have been horrified to hear come out of her mouth.

After satisfying herself that the burgundy leather was unharmed, she scanned the mail and put away the groceries.

When she picked up the bag to throw it away, she saw a piece of paper on the table beneath it.

A note to her, written in Dawn's messy scrawl.

I knew you'd forget, so I'm leaving this to remind you that I'm spending the night with Wil and Tara. Please feed my cat.

Buffy smiled. Her sister really had her pegged.

She HAD forgotten about the overnight visit. It had something to do with Dawn's final exams, and needing Willow's math and science brain to help her cram.

*<*Just as well...MY math brain couldn't get her ready to make change at McDonalds.*>*

Crumbling up the note, she tossed it into the trash and then located a can of cat food in the cupboard.

"Midnight!" she called out. "Chow's on...come and get it while it's.." She grimaced at the gloppy mess as it plopped into the cats food dish, "...completely disgusting!"

As she placed the dish on the floor, the cat strolled into the kitchen.

"Hi, kitty." Buffy watched the feline walk by with her ' cat attitude ' going full blast, not even acknowledging another presence in the room. "Stupid cat," she murmured.

Her eyes widened with surprise when Midnight turned to stare at her malevolently, as though she knew that she was being insulted.

Buffy had never cared for cats, being much more of a doggy lover. But, Spike had shown up at the door one night, carrying a tiny scrap of black kitten that he'd found on it's own in the park.

Dawn had fallen instantly in love with the scrawny little beast, and had begged Buffy to let her keep it.

She'd given in without a fight. Dawn had been so completely vulnerable at the time. Losing the woman she thought of as her mother, finding out about her own bizarre origins, and then that mess with Glory. A mess they'd all barely escaped from with their lives.

Squealing with delight, Dawn had thanked Spike sweetly, then ran upstairs to fashion a bed for the kitten out of a shoe box and an old towel.

Buffy had turned to Spike with a pleased smile. "That was nice of you," she'd said.

Spike, not wanting to appear to be ' nice ' in any way, had tried to soft pedal it.

"Well," he'd shrugged. "I couldn't just let it die, and I wasn't hungry, so..."

"Eww...yuck!" Buffy had yelped, punching his arm and trying not to laugh.

That had been a good moment between them, something they'd been having more and more of. The bond that had started to form during their 'Glory' days had grown stronger, and she had begun to depend on Spike...not just for help or protection for Dawn, but for company and friendship as well.

The others had moved into more committed stages of their own relationships, often making Buffy feel left out and alone.

But Spike always made sure she didn't feel that way for long.

The more time they spent together, the stronger the pull between got, until it had finally reached it's nadir one night in her living room.

He had come to the house early in the evening, and had gone with her on her rounds. They'd prowled around four different cemeteries that night, but the hunt had been unsuccessful and they'd been back at her house before eleven o'clock.

Dawn had been spending the night with a friend, and Buffy hadn't felt like being alone. It hadn't taken a lot of effort on her part to coax Spike into sticking around for a while.

They had watched a movie on cable, and played with the cat, after which Spike had produced a deck of cards from his coat pocket and tried to teach Buffy how to play poker.

Gingersnaps had served as chips, but Buffy couldn't remember what beat what. She kept showing him her cards so he could explain what kind of hand she was holding.

After an hour, he had gotten fed up and refused to play anymore, telling her that she'd never understand and suggesting that, in the future, she stick to playing the sort of baby games that her immature brain could process.

Buffy had thrown her cards at him, then started pelting him with gingersnaps. Laughing, Spike had jumped to his feet, daring her to come and get him.

She'd accepted that dare, tackling him in the entryway and sending them both to the floor in a tangle of arms and legs.

The first to recover, Buffy had pounced on him. Straddling his waist, she'd pinned his hands to the floor and yelled for a stake. Spike had flipped her over his head, then chased her around the house, finally ending up in the kitchen.

Unaware that Buffy had stakes hidden in every room, he had allowed her to corner him.

She'd brandished the weapon in her hand, and he had immediately fallen to his knees, hands raised in supplication, pleading for the slayer to spare his worthless life.

He'd offered her money, furs, jewels...anything her heart desired. By the time he'd gotten around to washing the dishes and bathing the cat...two chores she detested...he'd reduced her to a fit of child like giggles, and she'd declared that she would be merciful.

After asking her politely to drop the stake, he had picked her up and slung her over his shoulder, then carried her into the living room and dumped her on the sofa.

When Buffy had stopped laughing and caught her breath, she had smiled at him kneeling on the floor beside her. It had been such a long time since she'd acted silly and playful, and she'd enjoyed it so much that she'd thanked him by giving in to a sudden impulse and kissing him.

Spike had been as surprised by her behavior as she was, but he'd recovered quickly. Slipping one hand behind her neck, he'd pulled her closer, deepening the kiss.

Making soft little whimpers in her throat, Buffy's head had begun spinning in a mightily pleasant way. Kissing had always been one of her favorite activities when it came to the art of foreplay.

Whether it was slow and tender, or passionate and fierce, she enjoyed it all, and she considered herself to be quite proficient at it.

But, if SHE was proficient, then HE was expert. In the hundred and twenty odd years of his existence, Spike had learned everything there was to know about kissing and how to apply the knowledge in a given situation.

Spike kissed like there was no tomorrow, and it was obvious that he enjoyed doing it, that it wasn't just a means to an end, but an end in itself.

Buffy had learned THAT for the first time during Willow's case of witchcrafty hiccups after Oz had left town.

Whatever else you might say about Spike, you had to give credit where it was so fantastically due...he knew how to please a woman.

Buffy had been on the giving and the receiving end of many kisses, and Spike was, hands down, the BEST kisser she'd ever had her lips on...bar none.

That night on her sofa, Buffy had again been treated to a demonstration of his considerable skills. She had burrowed closer, wanting more and more. More of his kiss...more of his touch...more of everything.

But when she had begun tugging at him, trying to pull him up onto the sofa, he'd bailed out on her.

Catching her searching hands in his, he'd held them in a firm grip while he slowly brought her out of the kiss.

They had stared into each other's eyes for a long moment, until Spike broke the spell. Leaping to his feet, he'd stammered out a strained "g'night slayer" and almost ran from the house, leaving Buffy in a state of arousal that she'd not felt in a very long time.

Sleep had not come easily that night. Every time she'd closed her eyes, all Buffy had been able to see...was Spike. As the hours crawled by, she'd finally come to terms with the realization that she was damn well sick and tired of denying her feelings, and owned up to the mutual attraction born on that long ago night when they'd seen each other for the first time.

The whole of the memory was bisected into two halves in Buffy's mind. The first half was a little sketchy. She remembered being at the Bronze with Willow and Xander, but couldn't recall what she'd been wearing. She knew that she'd done some homework, but not what class it had been for. The three of them had danced a little, but Buffy could not have said what music had been playing. She'd had something to drink, but didn't know what.

The second half of the evening, however, was was as sharp and as clear as a freshly cut diamond.

She'd heard the request for a phone with which to summon the authorities to deal with an assault going on outside...some big guy trying to bite someone.

Reacting on instinct, Buffy had run outside to take care of the situation herself. Forgetting her stake, she'd yelled at Xander to move his ass and get her one.

The vamp had been one of those cocky shits who actually believed that THEY would be the one to bring the slayer to her knees.

Without even breaking a sweat, she had corrected that misguided notion.

But the memory that stood out clearer than any other, had been hearing the vampire call for help just a moment before she'd dusted him.

Wondering just who in the hell ' Spike ' was, she had turned at the sound of mocking applause as he'd stepped out of the shadows.

When her eyes got a message to her brain, the first thought it had produced was 'That is the hottest guy I have ever seen and where has he been all my life?'

Thoughts of Angel had been briefly wiped from her memory bank, until she knew who...what...she was facing.

Hearing his subsequent death threat, and knowing him to be another vampire still hadn't doused the sizzling electrical charge zinging back and forth between them, stunning her into brief immobility.

His body was lean but strong looking, and he moved with an inbred grace that Buffy hadn't encountered in any other vampire.

The clothes he'd had on suited him, especially that ankle length leather coat he'd been wearing. Unrelieved black, the only touch of color a red shirt he'd worn loosely tucked into his jeans.

With fair skin and white blonde hair, and eyes so dark blue that they appeared black as well, he was a study in contrast.

But it was his face that really commanded her attention. Perfectly sculpted from white marble it was, with high cheekbones, and a well formed nose. A smart ass smile and a scar over one eye were all that kept him from possessing an angelic beauty.

Certainly more so than Angel's. Dearly as she'd loved him, she'd never really gotten that ' one with the angelic face ' description. He was definitely attractive, but his features were far too blunt to be called angelic.

All in all, Spike was an arresting sight, and Buffy would have been willing to bet that his game face was just as enticing.

She'd had a brief moment of "Oh, boy do I want that!" followed by "What am I, nuts?" and then finished with "No fair...how come the only guys who get my motor running turn out to be demons in sheeps clothing? What is this...some sort of slayer test that the stupid council thought up to make sure I'm fighting on the right side?"

Even though it was highly unlikely that her newest adversary would turn out to be a good boy, she still found him sinfully attractive and wickedly sexy.

Knowing that such feelings for a member of the undead brigade went against everything Giles has spent so much time and effort to pound into her head, Buffy had locked them away, burying them so deeply in her subconscious mind that even SHE hadn't been aware of them.

But that pull between them just would not go away and leave her alone. In time, they had gone from a slow simmer straight to a full boil when Willow's dyslexic witchcraft had betrothed them.

When the magic that had driven them to nausea inducing displays of affection had finally ended, they had been in the middle of one of those ' earth shaking ' kisses she'd been enjoying all night.

Their eyes had met in stunned silence for an instant before they began to play out the behavior that they thought they should, the gagging, the wiping, and the swearing.

But that instant, that microsecond of awareness had been the most shocking revelation of her life.

Granted, she was hardly the most experienced woman in the world, but she'd felt that brief desire in him that wanted her to ignore everyone else and keep doing what she'd been doing.

She had seen it in his eyes, and he must have seen it in hers as well.

Feeling deeply guilty for inadvertently causing the whole mess, Willow had done everything short of tying herself to the railroad tracks and waiting for a train.

Although her friends frequent and fervent apologies had begun to grate on her nerves, Buffy had never so much as hinted that the experience hadn't been quite as harrowing as she'd made it out to be.

A few kisses? There, there...don't beat yourself up over it. She'd survived worse. Not to worry.

Except...except that it hadn't been "just a few kisses."

Stopping just short of actual intercourse, they'd done just about everything else that could be done.

Before the evenings festivities had kicked into high gear, Giles had dozed off on the sofa with a damp cloth over his sightless eyes.

Buffy had gone upstairs for a blanket to cover her sleeping watcher, not realizing that Spike had been right on her heels until he'd closed the bedroom door...and pounced!

She'd gone along willingly, literally throwing herself at him in her desire to be intimate with her brand new fiance'.

Spike had pushed her up against the wall, pinning her to it with his body and kissing her until her knees began to buckle.

Before she'd realized his intent, he'd pulled her blouse up beneath her arms, then slipped his hands around her back and unhooked her bra.

Touching her in all the right places, he had covered her face and throat with hard, wet kisses, all the while whispering the required ' sweet nothings ' to her, telling her how beautiful and sexy she was, and how much he'd always wanted her.

He'd unzipped her slacks and snuck one hand into the front of her panties, cupping her sex and rubbing her as he'd thrust his tongue deeply into her mouth where it touched and played with hers.

He used his free hand to take hold of hers and guided it down to the impressive bulge between his legs. Her fingers had automatically formed themselves around the erection that was straining the front of his very tight jeans, and he'd begged her to take it out and touch him properly.

Staring up into his eyes, she had unbuckled his belt and popped the top snap open. The zipper had begun to descend on its own, forced down by the pressure of his hard shaft.

Just as her fingers had reached to slide inside, Giles had called out from downstairs.

The slightly panicky note in her watchers normally measured tone, was the only thing that had kept them from anticipating their wedding night, right then and there.

That had been the last time they'd made contact with any sort of sexual connotations, until that night in her living room.

For some reason she'd never been able to accurately pin down, neither of them had brought up the subject of their mini makeout session on the sofa again, and Buffy had begun to think that she'd dreamt the whole thing up.





Part Two...


"No dream I've ever had was that good."

Buffy turned off the kitchen light and went upstairs. She intended to take full advantage of her solitude by hogging every drop of hot water in the tank.

The big question, of course, was why Spike hadn't tried to follow up on the kisses they'd shared. This went completely against everything she thought she knew about him.

Maybe it was because the first time he had tried to declare himself, she'd punched him dead in the face.

*<*And as we all know, there's nothing quite like breaking a guy's nose to encourage amorous feelings...*>*

Not that he hadn't deserved it. Being nailed in the ass with a cattle prod chained to a wall, and threatened with the loss of her vitals didn't exactly make her want to hand over the key to her heart.

From that day to this, Spike had never again told her that he loved her.

He'd stood beside her during the most horrible experience of her life... and she'd had some pretty horrible experiences, so that was really saying something... but he hadn't uttered the words out loud.

And the one and only time he HAD confessed his love, he hadn't even asked her to love him in return. All he'd wanted was for her to acknowledge the possibility that someday...maybe...she wouldn't completely loathe him.

It couldn't have been easy for him. A vampire pouring his heart out to a slayer? Admitting that he thought only of her, dreamed only of her, and wanted no one but her.

She, true to form, had totally shot him down. Forgetting, or pushing to the back of her mind, the kisses and touches they'd shared mere weeks ago, she had rejected him with violence and hateful words, capping it off by barring him from her house.

Even then, he hadn't given up. He'd followed her home that night, begging her to talk to him, to give him just one chance to prove that he'd changed.

She hadn't wanted to listen, hadn't wanted to accept that he had any real desire to change, or even that he COULD.

Because that would mean she had been wrong...and she hated being wrong.

If she had admitted the possibility that Spike had changed because of his feelings for her, it would mean that he'd done it without benefit of soul restoration. Left to his own devices, all by himself, he'd made a choice.

This brought on the painful knowledge that if Spike could choose, then Angel/Angelus could have done the same.

But he hadn't. And he never would have.


<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>


Buffy stared at herself in the mirror as her past was painfully rehashed in her mind, understanding...maybe for the first time...that she hadn't really rejected Spike because she'd hated him, no matter what she'd said to the contrary.

She'd done a fairly good job of convincing herself of it at the time, but now she finally had to step up to the plate and admit that she'd actually rejected him because she was afraid not to.

Buffy had already loved one vampire, and it had blown up in her face so violently that you could hear it on the moon, causing a great amount of pain and a double dose of danger to her and everyone she loved.

Could she honestly risk having it all happen again?

She shook off that disquieting train of thought.

*<*Yeah, but...things are different now...SPIKE is different now...*>*

Angel had left her for what he considered to be her own good.

Then, Riley had left because she'd been unable to give him what he needed...the whole of her heart.

Poor Riley. He'd figured out long before she did that her feelings for him were not all they should be, despite her heated denials.

His need for the kind of satisfaction he'd gotten in that vampire whorehouse he'd been frequenting, had been so strong...so uncontrollable...that she would never have been able to understand or fulfill it, or to put it behind her and begin to rebuild their relationship.

She may have forgiven, but she would never forget.

The image of him, of what she'd caught him doing, was so indelibly burned on her brain that she'd feared she'd never be able to look at him the same way again.

Angel and Riley had both left her, each for his own reasons.

Spike would never leave her. She knew this just as surely as she knew the earth revolved around the sun.

He had stayed during the days when her favorite after school activity had been playing dodge ball with her stakes, screaming at him to hop the noon stage out of Sunnydale cause the town wasn't big enough for the both of them.

If he'd remained during that sort of treatment, why in the world would he go now that things were looking so delightfully up between them?


<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>


*<*What's his damn problem anyway? What, am I suddenly icky or something?*>*

Stripped down to her bra and panties, she studied her reflection with a critical eye.

*<*Nope... nobody here but us non-icky type people...*>*

Her hair was a pleasing shade of light brown and honey, thick and shiny with health. Her complexion was clear and smooth, and her light green eyes were large and long lashed.

Buffy's gaze wandered down her body.

There was nothing wrong with her figure either. A fast metabolism allowed her to eat pretty much anything she wanted without having it show up on her hips, or across the seat of her pants.

She turned to one side.

She had once despaired of ever developing a more womanly shape and size, even in spite of her mother's assurances that the females in her family were late bloomers.

Buffy had almost fallen for the old "late bloomers will still be beautiful when they're very old, while the early ones sparkle for a while and then fizzle out" trick.

But just as she had been about to look into the cost of breast augmention surgery, Mother Nature had finally gotten off her ass and done her job.

In no time at all, Buffy's breasts became full and firm, and nicely rounded.

In the months before she'd thwarted her most recent apocalypse, she had been in such a stressed out state of mind that her appetite had all but disappeared, and she'd become dangerously thin all over.

It was nice to look in the mirror and see that things were back where they belonged.

She examined her legs with a particularly strong satisfaction. They were great legs, even if she did say so herself.

Straight and strong, her legs had gotten plenty of male admiration whenever she'd displayed them in the ridiculously short skirts she'd worn through most of high school.

Factor in a flat and firm abdomen, slender hips, a small waist and...

"A pretty cute little ass, too."

...what more could any man reasonably want?

So, why didn't Spike seem interested anymore?

*<*That's a real good question...*>*

Shedding her underwear, she padded down the hall naked and started the shower.

*<*Maybe he IS interested, but thinks I might beat the stuffing out of him if he acts like it...*>*

She opened the shower door and stepped under the hot spray. After thoroughly soaking herself in it, she scrubbed her face clean of make-up, washed and conditioned her hair, then shaved her legs and armpits.

With the necessities completed, she applied a glob of vanilla scented body wash on a soft sponge.

She always smiled when she did this, ever since she'd noticed what the creamy soap looked like as it squirted out of the bottle.

*<*Oh, stop it...*>*

Buffy worked up a fragrant lather as she guided the sponge over her skin. Moving it down between her breasts and over her abdomen, she leaned against the tile as her body relaxed and became receptive, sensitive to the lightest touch.

She jerked when she heard the shower door open, then gasped out loud at the feel of a strong arm sliding around her waist from behind.

"Slayer..."

A mere whisper in her ear. A familiar voice, soft and low with desire.

Without thinking twice, she pressed herself back against cool, hard muscle.

"Let me," the voice demanded, as the sponge was taken from her hand.

"Yes," she responded breathlessly. Dropping her head back, she tilted it to one side and exposed the vulnerable flesh of her throat with no worries.

The sponge passed over and around the curves of her breasts, stimulating her highly sensitive skin. She released a faint whimper as the lather trickled down over her hard nipples, falling to the shower floor with soft plops.

There was an evil chuckle as the sponge ceased its sensual torture.

She responded with, "Hey! Don't stop."

"Never," he promised.

The sponge continued on its merry way, over her stomach and down her thighs.

"Open up for me, luv."

She complied with the request, but stopped the sponge from reaching its obvious target.

"No soap down there," she said. "Down there is a bad place for soap to go. Trust me on this."

"Sorry, sweetheart." The sponge fell to the floor with a splat, replaced by a quickly rinsed hand. "Better?"

"Mmm...yes. Very much better."

Her knees were getting ready to abandon ship as she was skillfully massaged between her thighs.

"Do you like that?" he purred. "Does it feel good?"

"Yeah-huh," Buffy nodded. "Very good. SO damn good."

She was nearly beyond the power of speech, reduced to monosyllabic words.

"And...if I do this?" He found the sweet spot with the tip of one finger, rubbing it firmly. "Or this..."

There was sliding pressure inside of her, making her body jerk with instant response.

The pressure left, only to return immediately.

Over and over. Faster...harder...deeper...until she knew that she was about to....

Release hit her hard, and her head snapped back, impacting painfully on the hard tile wall.

"OUCH!" she yelped as her eyes flew open. "That..." Her jaw dropped when she saw that she was alone in the shower. "..hurt?"

She looked down, and her cheeks flamed scarlet when she saw that the arm around her waist was hers. Not to mention the fingers between her legs.

"Great," she panted, rolling her eyes. "Just perfect."





Part Three...
 

 

Twisting the taps off, Buffy stepped out of the shower and wrapped herself in a towel.
 
Back in her room, she dried her hair and  smoothed lotion with the same vanilla scent as her bodywash into her skin.
 
After rummaging around in her dresser for a nightgown, she pulled on an over sized jersey that her father had once brought home from a football game.
 
The garment was so big that it hung below her knees, but it was soft from frequent laundering, and it carried memories of a time in her life when things were still good between her parents and the only thing she'd had to worry about were her grades.
 
As she dropped her dirty clothes into a hamper, her stomach growled, reminding her that she hadn't eaten dinner yet.
 
Down in the kitchen, she stared into the fridge, searching for something easy to eat. She didn't feel like cooking only for herself, so she grabbed the grape jelly, then found a half empty jar of peanut butter in the pantry and made herself a sandwich.
 
She took a bite of it and returned the jelly to its sticky spot at the bottom of the fridge.
 
About to reach for a can of orange soda, her eye was caught by a dark green  bottle.
 
It was champagne that Giles had presented her with on her twenty-first birthday. He'd made a little speech about wanting Buffy's first alcoholic beverage to be memorable.
 
A loud clearing of his throat by Xander had caused her watcher to amend his statement to her first 'legal' alcoholic beverage.
 
Giles had advised her not to open it then, but to chill it so she could enjoy it properly.
 
Buffy had stuck it in the back of the refrigerator and promptly forgotten that it was there.
 
Examining the label now, she could tell that this stuff was expensive. She'd seen enough wine lists in restaurants to know that this particular brand of champagne cost well over a hundred dollars a bottle.
 
She found a corkscrew in a drawer  crammed with various kitchen utensils that she never used.
 
"Let's see how memorable you are."
 
She easily withdrew the cork, expecting the loud 'POP', followed by the gush of foamy liquid that she'd seen in so many movies.
 
But, when all she got was a soft 'pop' and no gush at all, she frowned.
 
"What..have you gone flat or something?"
 
Sniffing the contents of the bottle, she felt a tingle in her nose that made her sneeze.
 
She took one of her mother's good  crystal wine glasses from the cupboard and filled it with a golden flow of liquid that sparkled and fizzed.
 
Remembering her previous adventures in drinking, she was prepared to wrinkle her nose in distaste when she took an experimental sip.  Instead, she found herself pleasantly surprised at the taste of the wine.
 
"Good."  She took a bigger sip. "VERY good."
 
She drained the glass, refilled it, then took both it and the bottle into the living room.  Pausing in front of the window, she peered out and saw that it was raining even harder.
 
Making herself comfortable on the sofa, she took another sip of champagne.
 
As she began to feel giddily lightheaded, she closed her eyes to enjoy the sensation.
 
The sound of laughter startled her and she sat up straight. "Dawn?"
 
After several seconds of silence, she decided that she'd imagined the laugh, and settled back into the fat cushions of the sofa.
 
She finished the wine in her glass, then grabbed the bottle and refilled it.
 
Holding it up in the mellow lamplight, she watched the bubbles fizzle and pop.
 
"Pretty." She admired the color as it caught the light. "Almost too pretty to drink."
 
Turning the stem of the glass between her thumb and forefinger, she shrugged.
 
"Almost." She tossed back the wine and stifled an unladylike burp.
 
She had a little difficulty lining up the neck of the bottle with the rim of her glass, and they connected with a sharp 'clink'.
 
"Shit..."
 
Another burst of giggling distracted her.  "All right...who the hell is doing that?"
 
Common sense told her to stand up and prepare to defend herself, but when she swung her feet down to the floor, her wobbly legs warned her not to try.
 
Somewhere in her half soused brain, Buffy knew that she shouldn't drink anymore of the champagne.
 
Disembodied laughter was a warning that something bad was about to happen, most likely to her.
 
How would it look if something evil showed up to pick a fight and the slayer was  tipsy... hammered... plastered... bombed out of her skull... three sheets to the wind and the fourth one....
 
"Aw, screw it," she muttered as she poured. "I'm not driving."
 
She polished off the glass in three long swallows, vaguely trying to rationalize her behavior.
 
<I opened the bottle and it's gonna go flat and it was really expensive so I gotta finish it else it'll be wasted and like mother always said...waste not- waste not...>
 
"No, that's wrong...it's waste not-what not...yeah, thass it...no, thass not it...maybe it's where not..it could be..is it why not..I think that..."
 
She ran out of steam. "Never mind. Mother said lots of stuff...I can't be esspected to remember every little thing she said, now can I?"
 
The invisible laugh track sounded off again.
 
"Okay, THASS IT!"  Struggling to her feet, dizziness suddenly swamped her, forcing her to grab the am of the sofa to keep from falling down. "I want to know WHO you are and what the hell is sooo damn bunny..FUNNY..I
meant!"
 
Her eyes darted around the room, peering owlishly into the dim corners. "I got four words for you...!"
 
She counted them on her fingers.
 
"Do-Not-Mess-With-Me!" 
 
Wait a second.
 
She recounted each finger silently, her lips moving.
 
"Okay! Okay, thass...thass actually five words..BUT....
 
Putting on her meanest slayer face, she pointed accusingly at...nothing.
 
..I mean every one of those four words..those five words!"
 
She shook her head a little, trying to clear the haze.
 
"Are you looking for trouble? ARE you? Cause ifff...you are...then you came to the right place, bucko!  I'll GIVE you trouble. Give you all the trouble you want...cause I'm...I'm the..."
 
She frowned, trying to remember who she was.
 
"Oh! Yeah! I...am the slayer...the goddamn chosen one. You screw with ME.. and I...will kick..your..ASS!  Thass what I do! I'm an assss kicker!"
 
When no one came forward to challenge her, Buffy flopped back down on the sofa and  smiled "Scared it off."
 
She picked up the champagne, carefully lining up the bottle with the rim of her glass.
 
Unaware that she wasn't tipping the bottle  high enough, she was surprised to see that her glass was only half full.
 
"Hmm...guess it all depends on your point of view," she waxed philosophical, trying  to look down the neck of the bottle and find what she wanted.
 
<This thing's empty...it can't be empty. Is it? All gone...nothing there...finished up...over and out..oh, this is stupid...it CAN'T be empty cause I've only had...>
 
"Uh-oh."  Her eyes widened as she realized she had absolutely no idea how many  glasses of champagne she'd swilled.
 
<Well, let's be logical here. I've had enough to empty the bottle or it wouldn't be...empty. But I don't know how many glasses it takes to fill the bottle up in the first place..>
 
Trying to work through it in her mind was making her dizzier than she already was, so she decided not to worry about it.
 
"Who cares, anyway?  Iss not like I'm falling down drunk or..or something."
 
<That's very true...you're lying down drunk...>
 
"So what if I am?" she asked pugnaciously. "Iss MY champagne."  She pointed to her chest with her thumb. "I can do whatever I want to do...with it.  I can wash the car...or..or water plants...I can take a BATH in it if I want to."
 
Turning sideways on the sofa, Buffy pulled her  feet up and leaned back against the armrest.
 
"I'm an adult, you know!" she declared. "Over twenny-one...and I got rights.  The Consitution of the Uniiided...America...saysss I do."
 
She pulled her nightshirt down over her knees.
 
"They says that I got certain inalienand...an alien an bull..rights...I got 'em...we all got 'em.  Like...like I gotta right to an attorneee...I gotta right to make speeches free...and I gotta right to arm bears...and I gotta right to get shitfaced with MY birthday present."
 
<Not that I am...but I can if I want to...>
 
"Oh, well," she sighed deeply. "Thissss is a dead soldier, soldier." She placed the bottle on the table and saluted it.
 
Sliding farther down on her back, she felt something digging into her kidneys. Send one hand down on a search, it came back with the t.v. remote.
 
"Nice to see ya," she said. Aiming it in the direction of where she remembered the television being, she thumbed the
on button.



CONTINUED...

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