Title: Check Up
Prompt:Alternate History: Event Changed
Medium: Fic
Rating: PG-13
Warnings:Language

Summary:Hank Summers finally gives his daughter a call.

Buffy stared at the number on her phone incredulously, letting her thumb hover over the talk button as she tried to come to grips with what was happening. Was he really doing this? Why now, of all times?

She sighed and Spike placed a soft hand on her shoulder. "You gonna answer tha'?" he asked. Buffy hesitated before nodding and visibly straightening.

"Hello?" she answered.

"Hey, Sweetheart, how are you doing?" her fathers voice echoed from the phone.

"I've been better." Buffy said shortly, "How's your secretary?"

"You're stepmothers doing fine, she's pregnant now, and we just wanted to call to check up, see how you were doing." Hank said slowly, "How is Dawnie, by the way? And your mother?"

"Dead." Buffy said bluntly, "They died last year. If you answered your phone you would know this."

There was a long stretch of silence before Hank managed to finally cough out, "Ah, they – they're dead? H-How did that happen?"

Buffy bit her tongue and managed not to blurt out 'Well, Dawn jumped into a hellish portal to save the world.' Instead, she said, "Mom died of an aneurism. Dawn was in a car accident."

"Well, I-I'm sorry Buffy, I didn't know…is there anything I can do for you?"

Buffy felt her hand tighten around the phone. Oh, she could think of a lot of things that he could do for her – how about help her pay off all the bills that the hospital left her? Or maybe coming to visit, give her a hug and tell her he loved her? Maybe come over to meet her fiancé, who just happened to be a blood sucking vampire?

"No, there isn't anything you can do for me." Buffy began, "but there is one thing you can do. When your new wife gives birth, and you're a father again, I want you to do everything for that baby that you never did for Dawn. I want you to treat them like a gift and I want you to love them in a way you never loved me. Because they deserve a father."

She didn't even let him respond. She just cut off the call and placed the phone face down on the table. She was silent for a long time before Spike finally spoke.

"You gonna be okay?" he asked. Buffy sighed shakily and nodded before pressing her forehead into his shoulder.

"Maybe one day I'll finally accept that he just doesn't care." She murmured, "I'll just go on with my life without hoping he might pay attention."

Spike just kissed her forehead softly, holding her close to him as she tried to pull herself together. The call from her father had shaken her, and the fact that she was forced to relive the pain she was finally starting to cope with made his heart clench painfully in his chest.

"You know that you do have a father, right?" Spike asked, "Maybe not by blood, but you got one. 's much as we don't get along, Rupert would do anythin' for you. He'd do anythin' to help you."

Buffy sniffled and nodded into his chest, "I know. It still hurts that he can be so…so…stupid!"

Spike just pressed another kiss to her head and rubbed her arm softly, knowing that if he ever got the chip out of his head, despite that he knew he would never kill someone if it hurt Buffy, the first thing he was going to do was show up at Hank Summers doorstep and give the bastard a piece of his mind.

No one hurt his girl. Not even her father.