Chapter 11: Don't Go

Buffy, Willow, and Xander occupied three chairs in an otherwise empty waiting room outside the trauma surgery area at Sunnydale Memorial. Two hours ago, Giles had been taken in for emergency surgery to stop bleeding inside his abdomen. The others waited more or less patiently for news. The doctors said they wouldn't know anything, including the duration of the surgery, until they opened Giles up and saw what they were dealing with.

Midnight came and went with no news. Buffy made Xander go home after he fell asleep so hard that he toppled out of his chair. For her part, Willow couldn't even think about sleep at this point. She vacillated between pacing around the room and sitting in her chair staring into space. Buffy was trying to be the strong one, as always, but Willow caught her crying at the vending machines.

"Buffy," Willow said gently, "maybe you should go home, too. Even if he does come out of surgery, they're not going to let us see him right now. We're not family and it's the middle of the night. I can stay. I'm still getting over my jetlag so my sleep schedule already makes no sense. Besides, you have work in the morning and you'll need to be the one to tell Dawn what happened."

Buffy let out a big breath. "Dawn. She's going to lose it."

"Yeah, probably," Willow agreed. "Go home and get some sleep. I'll text you the second I know something, promise."

Buffy nodded reluctantly, a wave of exhaustion coming over her. "Okay." The pair hugged and Buffy left to walk home.

Alone in the waiting room, Willow paced uneasily. Another two hours passed. She checked with the nurses' station for the tenth time, but knew that they wouldn't have anything to tell her.

Willow began imagining all of the possible reasons that the surgery could be talking so long. They couldn't stop the bleeding. Giles' organs had been damaged beyond repair and they had to remove one or more of them. Giles' heart had stopped and they had to restart it. Each scenario was more gruesome and upsetting than the last. Despite her exhaustion, or perhaps because of it, Willow began to get more and more agitated as she waited. She had convinced herself that Giles wasn't going to survive the surgery, and her anxiety grew and grew as she paced the floor.

Realizing she was getting herself too worked up, Willow grabbed a magazine from the rack, but as soon as she touched it, the magazine turned to sludge in her hands. She reached for another magazine but achieved the same result. Willow looked at the piles of goop on the floor, then stared at her hands. What the hell is happening? she wondered. Panic, on top of her worry for Giles, started to build.

Willow walked slowly over to a plant on the coffee table. She reached out her hand, but just as her fingertips grazed the tallest leaf, the plant disintegrated into a puddle of sludge. Okay, confirmed, now let's stop touching things.

With a bang, it hit her: she was doing it. With her mind, with magic. I've been thinking about how things are falling apart¸ she worked out in her head. So now I'm making things literally fall apart.

She immediately stood still and closed her eyes. Get a grip, Willow, she told herself. This accidental magic thing has the potential to be really damaging. Nope, not good enough. You break it, you buy it. Still cursed with mush fingers. She opened her eyes and rubbed her eyebrows nervously. She remembered her hair going black with Oz and she was afraid the same thing would happen here, only Giles wouldn't be around to pick up the pieces. Imagine what Giles would say if he knew you were losing control of your magic.

That did it. The thought of Giles' disappointment was like a bucket of cold water. Willow felt her brain snap into focus. She closed her eyes again and concentrated on clearing her mind. Within moments, she felt the traces of the spell fade away as though blown by the wind. Willow was even able to return the magazines and the plant to their former states.

Plopping down in a chair, Willow finally gave into fatigue and caught a few minutes of sleep.

An hour before dawn, the surgeon emerged and gently roused Willow.

"Hi, I'm Doctor Hernandez," the woman explained. "I've just come from fixing up your friend Rupert."

Even in her dazed state, Willow found the use of Giles' given name rather humorous. After stifling a smile and getting up out of her chair, she asked, "How is he?"

"He's going to be okay," Doctor Hernandez reassured Willow. "He had some internal bleeding that took us a long time to get under control, but his prognosis is good. He's recovering in his room now, but you can see him tomorrow."

Willow thanked the doctor four times before finally letting her leave. Sticking her hands in her back pockets, Willow walked around the room, trying to figure out what she should do. She could go home, she could stay here…oh, Buffy! She whipped out her phone.

[Giles is out of surgery. He's okay.]

Then, knowing that Buffy would want to come straight here:

[Doc says no visitors til tomorrow/later today. He's still recovering.]

Buffy, who evidently was not sleeping very heavily, replied:

[Thanks Wil. You're the best.]

Willow stuck her phone back in her coat pocket and paced the room some more. If only there were a way that she could see Giles right now.

An idea began forming in the back of her brain. The only thing stopping her from visiting Giles was that the nurses would kick her out if they say her. If they never saw her, they couldn't make her leave. A modified glamour-type spell might do the trick. If she could be invisible to the staff, she could stay with Giles until he woke up.

Escaping to a broom closet, Willow began to chant.

Gods who shape the fates of all

I beg you now to hear my call

Let those here sworn to do no harm

Fail to see who casts this charm

Stepping out into the hallway, Willow thought about how to test to see if her glamour had worked. She walked over to the nurses' station and gave a little "ahem". The nurse on duty looked up, appeared confused, then returned to his paperwork. Success! she thought.

She waited for the coast to be clear, then stole into Giles' recovery room. He looked bad. Willow had known in an intellectual sense what to expect when someone had emergency surgery, but the sight of Giles hooked up to all the machines was devastating. Tears slid down Willow's cheeks freely.

Pulling the visitor's chair right up next to his bedside, Willow sat as near to Giles as she could. She grabbed his hand and brought it up to her face, relieved at the warmth of his skin next to hers.

Her tears falling onto his knuckles, she whispered, "We agreed not to get hurt." Her voice broke and she couldn't say any more. She simply held his hand and breathed. Ten minutes later, she was asleep in the chair, her hand still grasping his.

As the late morning sun filtered into the hospital room, Giles' eyes opened just a crack. His head was swimming. He recognized the familiar sensation of being heavily medicated. Realizing he had been seriously injured, he did a quick mental check. He could see and hear. He could wiggle his toes. He had all his fingers.

He felt something in his hand and looked over. Willow Rosenberg was passed out seated next to his bed, her fingers lightly resting on his. Evidently, she had been holding his hand. He smiled softly, taking a moment to appreciate her beauty even while she slept in a horrible hospital-provided chair. As he studied her face, he remembered the night before. The Gaarvoth, the fight at the cemetery, the demon's horn piercing Giles' gut. He had vague recollections of an ambulance, but nothing after that until he woke up in this room.

The Watcher reached his hand towards Willow another inch, recapturing her hand in his. It took a disconcerting amount of effort. Willow awoke with a start, crying out fearfully, "Giles!"

After blinking and shaking her head a few times, Willow's eyes focused and she saw that Giles was awake. For a split second, Willow's expression betrayed desperation and panic, but she immediately fixed her features into something resembling a neutral, strong expression. Giles recognized that she was trying to be tough for him.

"Willow," he breathed, "are you alright?"

Willow laughed, the sound coming out almost as a sob. "You're the one in the hospital and your first question is whether I'm alright?"

"Fair enough," Giles acknowledged, "I suppose that's a bit silly of me."

Willow's eyes shone with tears but she renewed her effort to keep a brave face. "You're going to be okay, by the way. They say you're going to be okay."

"What happened after the cemetery?" Giles asked.

"You rode in an ambulance and came here to Sunnydale Memorial Hospital. They took you straight into surgery. You were in there for over six hours. The doctor said you had a lot of internal bleeding that they had to get under control, but that you're okay now. You'll have to rest for a while, obviously, but they didn't have to remove anything."

"I suppose I'd be more concerned," Giles sighed, "if these drugs weren't so excellent. Where's Buffy? Is she okay too?"

Willow squeezed his hand. "She's fine, she went home. I told her I'd keep an eye on you. She's going to come by later today to check on you."

The door to the room opened and a nurse came in, a confused expression on her face. She scanned the room briefly. "Who were you talking to, Mister…" She consulted her chart. "…Giles?"

Giles looked over at Willow, then back to the nurse. "Well, is there anyone else in here?" he asked evasively.

"Nobody in here but us chickens," the nurse replied absentmindedly, scribbling notes onto the chart.

"Then I suppose I was talking to myself." Giles exchanged a look with Willow. He understood that she must have performed a spell to make herself invisible to the staff. It was not a particularly smart use of her power. He was impressed by the spell, of course, and it was endearing that she would do that for him, but they would need to discuss it later.

"How is your pain level, Mr. Giles?" the nurse asked.

"What pain?"

"That's the spirit. Press the call button if you need anything. Have a good day." With that, the nurse left the room.

Giles laid back on his pillow, exhausted just by that brief conversation. He felt as though he had been run over by a dozen trucks, then scraped off the street and placed into a cement mixer.

"I should let you get some rest. I just didn't want you to wake up alone, but I should probably go now," Willow whispered. She stood up, but Giles kept hold of her hand.

"Don't go," he pleaded. More than anything, he didn't want to be alone.

Willow's heart felt as though someone had reached in and squeezed all the blood out of it. Of course she would stay.

Giles gingerly scooted himself over to one side of the bed towards the IV stand, wincing sharply as he moved. Gently, Willow climbed onto the edge of the gurney, careful not to interfere with the monitoring equipment on that side. She lay slightly higher than Giles on the bed, curving her torso around his head and shoulders protectively. When she was settled, Giles nestled his head into the crook of her armpit.

Willow remembered her cuddling up to Giles like this on more than one occasion recently. She had needed him so badly, and she felt so much better when he held her. She hoped that she could comfort Giles as much as he comforted her.

"Stay with me," Giles whispered, his voice fading into nothing before he finished his sentence.

"Of course I will," Willow promised, kissing Giles on the forehead before they both fell asleep.

At 1 o'clock, the sound of whispering drew Willow out of her dreamless sleep. When she opened her eyes, she saw Buffy and Xander standing at the foot of Giles' hospital bed. Buffy wore a curious expression while Xander simply stared with his eyebrows arched nearly to his hairline.

Willow looked around and realized that she and Giles must look awfully cozy to her two friends. She could feel her face begin to flush with embarrassment. As she shifted on the bed, Giles also awoke, angling away from Willow then wincing at the effort.

Xander, deciding that this was neither the time nor the place for awkward heart-to-hearts, offered, "I always hated those hospital chairs, too. I fell asleep in one and ended up with a crick in my neck for a week. This just goes to show why Willow is the brains of the operation."

Giles, never more grateful for Xander's incessant chatter, played along. "Yes, thank you for staying, Willow, but I'll be very happy to have my bed back to myself."

Willow carefully climbed out of the bed and stood next to her friends.

Buffy, shrugging indifferently, moved over the Giles' bedside and presented him with a grease-stained paper bag. "We brought lunch!"

Over the next half hour, Buffy doted on Giles and made him eat entirely too much of the Doublemeat combo meal she had bought along. Willow, happy to hang back and let the conversation go on without her, interjected only when it would have been odd for her not to. Xander avoided making eye contact with Willow; she wasn't sure whether that was for the best or not.

The day nurse came into the room and looked from the bag of food to Giles to Buffy, offering a stern look. "It is not visiting hours," she stated loudly. "Mr. Giles needs his rest. Both of you need to leave."

"Both of us?" Buffy asked, confused about the nurse's choice of words. Weren't there three extra people in the room?

"Yes, you and your boyfriend need to give Mr. Giles some space. He can receive visitors another time."

Before Buffy could question her further, the nurse was shooing her and Xander from the room, and Willow dutifully followed. Willow shot one last glance at Giles, who gave her a small smile before she was out of sight.

As the gang walked back to the elevator, Buffy remarked, "That was weird. Willow, why didn't she try to kick you out, too?"

"Oh, uh," Willow fumbled, "Well, last night, I told her that I was Giles' niece, and that's why she let me stay. It must be a rule about families or something."

"I could have been Giles' niece," Buffy said, scowling. "Well, at least we got to see him and make sure he was okay. I wonder when they're going to release him."

"According to the doctor, it will depend on when Giles farts," Willow explained.

Xander tee-heed. "When he farts? That's a medical benchmark?"

"Yeah," Willow explained, her face totally serious. "You see, Giles had surgery on multiple organs, including his bowel. His basic function tests came back fine this morning, but in order to make sure that his digestive system is working okay, he needs to be able to fart. If he farts, he gets to go home."

Xander nodded slowly, his eyes wide. He looked as though he had learned more from those few sentences than from his entire career of formal schooling.

"Huh," Buffy marveled. "I had no idea that bringing him that burger was so crucial to his medical treatment."

With that, the gang boarded the elevator and headed out of the hospital.

Although Xander had offered Buffy and Willow a ride home from the hospital, they begged off, preferring the pleasant crispness of the fall air. As they walked, Willow took the opportunity to hear more about Buffy's life over the past two months.

"It's not so bad," Buffy assured Willow. "I mean, the people there are totally weird and you can smell me coming from a mile away, but my boss is nice. And it pays the bills. It's not glamorous, but it's enough for now. It's been hard ever since…" Buffy paused, then sighed. "Since Mom. But it's not as bad as it was."

Willow put her arm around the Slayer for a moment and gave her a reassuring squeeze as they moseyed down the sidewalk. Although they were both exhausted from the previous night's events, neither was in a particular hurry to get home.

"Now that I'm back," Willow offered, "maybe I'll be able to find a part-time job and help you out with some of the bills."

Buffy shook her head. "Willow, you haven't even been back a week. You don't need to worry about that. Seriously, you should be settling back in, maybe thinking about going back to school."

Willow leveled a skeptical look at her friend. "You think I'm going to sit around living rent-free in your house?"

"Remember the whole taking-care-of-Dawn-while-I-was-dead thing? You could coast for years on the karma left over from that."

Willow smiled and playfully bumped Buffy's shoulder with her own. "Alright, but you know I'm still going to look for a job anyway."

"Yeah, I know," Buffy acknowledged, matching Willow's smile.

"So what else has been going on around here? Dawn said something about Spike being weird? Like, weirder than usual?"

Buffy folded her arms across her chest and tucked her hands under her armpits. "Yeah," she admitted, but did not elaborate.

"Is he okay?" Willow wasn't really too concerned with Spike's wellbeing, but she knew Buffy was. It something mattered to Buffy, it mattered to Willow, too.

"Not really."

"Do I have to play twenty questions, or are you going to tell me what's up?"

Buffy glanced over at Willow and met her friend's concerned gaze. Arriving at Buffy's house, they parked themselves on the steps leading up to the porch. "Remember how Spike skipped town earlier this year?"

Willow nodded. Sighing, the Slayer launched into the story. "Well, he left after he…after we had a…a fight. When he got back, I found out that he had left because he wanted to get his soul back."

"Did he?"

"Yup, he sure did. Apparently there was some sort of ritual with painful trials. He went through this whole procedure to get his soul back."

"Why did he do that? He always gave Angel so much crap for having a soul."

"Yeah, I know. He says…" Buffy paused, then in a quiet voice, said, "He says he did it for me."

Willow's eyes went wide and she let out a breath. "Woah."

"Yeah. Woah." Buffy brought her knees closer to her chest.

"So are you two…have you…" Willow struggled to find the right words.

"We're not together. We're not going to be together. But he's different now and I don't really know what to do about it."

"Are you attracted to him?"

Buffy scrunched up her face and shrugged. "I dunno. I guess part of me always will be, but we are so over. Super over."

"Hey," Willow said brightly, "maybe you could date another human next. That could be fun."

Two hours after the nurse shooed everyone out of his room, Giles lay in bed staring at the ceiling. Alone and in pain, he had nothing to do with himself but sit and think. His embarrassment at having Buffy and Xander discover Willow in his bed had given him pause. Although he had recognized the necessity of keeping his indiscretions with Willow a secret, he now began to recognize the impossibility of building a real relationship with her. This whole endeavor, he decided, had been a dreadful mistake.

With every moment that passed, he grew angrier and angrier at himself. He had initiated a sexual relationship with a girl half his age. He had developed feelings for her when she was just 16 years old. That may be the age of consent in the UK, but that didn't make it morally acceptable. What's more, he had leveraged his position as teacher and mentor to bring her closer to him. She may have had feelings for him, but his long-standing influence over her made it impossible to know if she had really been acting of her own volition when she did…those things with him.

Giles had been battling with these demons for days, ever since the trip back from England. He had known all along what the right thing to do was, but he didn't have the spine to do it. He never should have allowed Willow to get so close to him, nor should he have even entertained the idea of becoming sexually involved with her, even if he thought it would benefit her in more than one way. Perhaps most egregiously, he never should have confessed his feelings for her. Sex makes things complicated enough; love is like an autoimmune disorder, making the heart act against its own best interests. Now that he and Willow had spoken their feelings for each other aloud, the only path that lay ahead was heartbreak.

Underneath this familiar rage and guilt was a new disappointment. When Willow was in danger, when she needed him most, Giles had failed her. In the graveyard, when the Gaarvoth was headed straight for her, Giles had barely given it pause before it tossed him aside and went after Willow.

The pain in his gut flared suddenly and he reached reflexively for the button to increase the dosage of medication. In the same moment, he stayed his hand. This pain was the very least he deserved. He took his hand from the button and balled his fist.

Giles' physical inability to protect Willow and his moral failure to remain honorable with her were his twin deficiencies. Either one would have been disquieting in the extreme, but together they were absolutely damning. Giles deserved neither Willow's respect nor her love. For a brief period, he had allowed himself the beautiful delusion that there might be something there, something they could build together. But now, thinking of the lightness he felt in his heart with Willow made Giles grind his teeth in disgust.

He had been a fool, a selfish and pompous old fool who would end up hurting a person whom he cared for very deeply. Lying there, replaying the events of the last few days in his mind, Giles came to a decision: as soon as he was sufficiently healed, he would be on the first flight back to London.