Description: My version of "Once More with Feeling" with a B/G twist.
Don't get me wrong, I love Spuffy fics, but I occasionally fall in love with B/G fics too because I'm in love with older men (especially A.S.H).
Disclaimer: Joss is Boss. For this chapter I'm borrowing Thriving Ivory's "Twilight". I recommend listening to it as you read.
No harm intended. No profit being made.
A/N: What did Giles sing about that first night? He never really says. He also later sings about wishing 'he could play the father'…is that maybe because he loves Buffy in a different way?
Impromptu
Giles gazed out of his hotel room window. The sun was setting over Sunnydale. After all the years of fighting evil in its various forms he could not remember ever really looking at the Californian sun transform the sky into a work of art.
He wished he could share it. A watcher's life was a lonely one, dedicated to one woman, always an arm's reach away.
Buffy.
He had been overwhelmed with joy at the news of her resurrection. It was short lived after his confrontation with Willow and the days to follow. Buffy seemed distant.
Going through the motions, as it were.
Perhaps she wouldn't step up and snap out of her haze as long as he was around. She was using him as a crutch to scrape by. What was the old adage? If you love something, let it go?
And by God, did he love her. But was it enough to let her go, even if it meant she might fall?
Giles reached for his handkerchief and began to polish his glasses. Twilight began to descend on the town. Emotion began to swell within him and the desire to release it was overwhelming.
Where was that music coming from?
The melody rose. They had both been so frustrated at each other. At the choices they would both face in the last days and hours up to the fight with Glory.
"I recall a long farewell and a time to choose
So we fought like rivers baby, yeah like rivers do"
Giles sighed. He leaned against the window frame.
"Show me what it looks like
Outside your window at twilight
Show me what it looks like"
Rupert placed his glasses back on his nose and turned from the window. He remembered how grief stricken he was over the loss of his Slayer. His purpose for being on this earth was gone.
"I recall driving home, this ain't gonna hit me till God knows when
You know I feel it in my bones and I wear it on my skin
But there ain't no use in right or wrong
A heart must go where it belongs"
There had been so many things he had wanted to show her, tell her.
"Show me what it looks like
Outside your window at twilight
Is it me that you see dancing on a line
Singing I could be yours if you would be mine
Come on grow old with me and surely you'll see"
He had never had the chance. She had died so her sister could live. So all of them could live.
His heart had shattered when he came upon her lifeless body in the center of the construction site.
"And I remember thinking, that boy you must be dreaming
So hold on, hold on, before it's all gone"
He had thought maybe he was the one who had died and this was his own personal hell. Created to torment him with what he feared most because he had killed Ben, an innocent. Surely Buffy was the one alive and grief stricken over his death.
"And I do remember thinking that your world would go on spinning
Without me now, so c'mon, c'mon please "
Dawns cries had brought him out of his wishful thinking. He was alive, but with his Slayer gone, his heart was dead.
A knock tapped on his door. Rupert moved to open the way for the wait staff to set up his room service. As the music swelled to a crescendo, the waiters began to dance around him, holding various implements that glittered around the room.
"Show me what it looks like
Outside you window at twilight
Show me what it looks like
Outside you window at twilight, yea"
The staff pranced out of the room.
Giles looked at his meal. His emotional stress would not allow him to eat. He turned his back on the food, back to the window. It was almost dark. Buffy would patrol soon.
"Yea, Show me what it looks like
Outside your window at twilight"
On the plane ride back, Giles had been determined to tell Buffy his feelings for her. He would not waste another second of their time together on this earth.
"Is it me that you see dancing on a line
Singing I could be yours if you would be mine
Show me what it looks like
Show me what it looks like
Show me what it looks like
Come on grow old with me and surely you'll see"
But she had come back broken, missing a piece, missing her spark. Would it be enough just to be here for her? Perhaps pulling the crutch from under her, leaving her to go back to England, would snap her back into reality.
"I recall a long farewell and a time to choose
So we fought like rivers baby, yeah like rivers do"
Had he just been singing?
A/N: Reviews are shiny and make me a better writer! This is my first attempt at Buffy FF. Drop me a line, even if it's a short: "I like where you're going" no flames please. And yes, I'm a aware I omitted one line of the song and change a few words.