Chapter 20

Just Fade Away

I showered when I got home. Lost in my thoughts, I stood motionless under the scorching stream. The hot water tank must have emptied, for the water quickly turned ice cold. I jolted back to my senses, and went to cut off the water, but as my hand neared the tap I found myself consumed by the idea of testing my will.

The water stung it was so cold, my muscles shaking, my tormented body begging me to step out. I thought of Alice, trembling in my arms.

There was a loud knock on the bathroom door.

"Buff? You okay in there?" Charlie's voice said, sounding concerned.

"I'm okay dad." I said, cutting off the water.

"Well, okay. I… just worry about you." He said.

I wrap myself in a towel. My body is so pale it was practically blue, the blood vessels in my skin tightly constricted against the cold.

I open the door a crack.

"Hi dad. It's okay. I was just shaving my legs. You have no idea how long it takes. You just have that little bit to worry about." I said, waving my finger at his mouth area.

"I guess." He said. "Why so late?"

"Couldn't sleep. Just bugging me s'all."

"Your mom called, she was worried about you- she said you hadn't phoned her since you got here."

"Oh. I didn't really have much to say to her, I guess. What did she say?"

"Well, she was pretty upset. She said she and Hank are getting a divorce."

That hits me pretty hard. I had been so wrapped up in my own issues I just assumed she was out there, doing okay. I didn't even realize they were having problems. I felt more shame piling up on my stack.

"Oh." I manage. "Is it okay if I call her in the morning?"

"Of course. Her new number and address is next to the phone." He says. "She asked if you were dating someone and I kinda dodged the question. I didn't tell her about Leah. Figured that is something for you to talk about."

My heart fell further. Poor Leah.

"Do… you think she will be okay? With me being… you know."

"Buffy she loves you, so much. I know she has a funny kinda way of expressing it, but she does. I am sure she will be fine."

I nod awkwardly. Charlie doesn't hover, he bids me goodnight and leaves me to my misery.

My shame seems written everywhere in my room. Framed against stark white, the objects there stand out. Alice's clothes hanging on Leah's frame. The twisted black metal mirror, made especially for me, holds my reflection, but I don't want look at it. Next to my bed is a crude stake. There are no pictures in my room. Not of mom, or of any friends. Just linen white walls and painful things.

I sit on my bed and draw my knees up to my chin, hugging my arms around them. My flesh is cold, my fingers puckered and rough against my skin. I feel like crying, but I don't deserve to, do I?

All this was my doing.

…

Mom doesn't answer the phone when I call her the next morning. Her new address is written on a scrap of paper: 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale C.A.

I leave a short message on her answering machine.

"Hi mom, it's me. Buffy. I tried to reach you. I'll try again later."

...

After breakfast, Charlie headed off to the station whilst I washed up.

My stomach was scrunched up into a knot of anxiety, I had no desire to go to school, the day could only get worse. I knew last night would be the last time I ever saw Alice. The thought of seeing that Alice shaped gap at school tore at my heart.

There was a knock at the door. I cautiously opened it.

The woman was in her late thirties with shoulder length blonde hair, somewhat nordic features and large green eyes. She wore small glasses with stylish frames, a long orange skirt over black stockings and boots, and a deep green sweater over a crisp white collared blouse. Her hand rests on the strap of a large shoulder sling bag.

"Buffy Summers?" she says, her accent is unfamiliar, Swedish perhaps? "Diana Cronquist." She says, extending a hand energetically. I am rather stunned that she is here, on my doorstep, and end up just staring awkwardly at her hand. It may as well have been a lobster holding a paintbrush.

She pulls her hand back awkwardly and clears her throat.

"You, spoke to me on the computer."

"My new Watcher?" I say. She beams and nods. She has freckles.

"Uh… sorry, I forget my manners, do come in."

"Should I take off my shoes?" she says.

"No, that's fine."

She strides into the house and spins on her heels, taking in the room.

"This is your pops?" She says, pointing at the picture of Charlie and my mom holding baby me.

"My dad. Charlie. He just left."

"Handsome. Ooooooh, and look at little you. So cute."

"Uh, sorry…"

"Diana".

"Yes, Diana, I am… this is all a bit much. I am still processing that you are really here."

"Me too. Weird isn't it?" She says, her green eyes locking on to mine. "I just passed a car with a cougar tied on the roof. An actual cougar."

Diana is looking at the kitchen now, like it holds some great clue to a mystery.

"Uh… so what happens now?"

"That depends on you." She says, turning to look at me with a elfish grin. "I would want that we go eat. I want to try buffalo wings."

"You know they aren't actually made from buffalo, right?"

She smiles and nods happily, her eyes flicking around the room. She feels like the sort of woman who is constantly humming songs to herself inside.

"Diana, I have to go to school."

"School?" She looks bemused. "Not today. There are more important things."

"There are?"

"Yes, like me trying buffalo wings and then… working out what we are going to do with you Miss Summers."

"Swan. It's Swan now."

"Hmmm? Let's go eat. I am starved."

…

Diana's rental is a brand new white 4x4. It has that new car smell as I climb in. We both seem tiny in the seats. She slings her bag into the backseat and I hear a familiar wooden rattle.

She pulls out rather too quickly, and heads the car back into town.

"Your real name isn't Buffy Summers on the records. It is still Elizabeth Swan." She says, matter of factly. "I couldn't find you after Merrick stopped reporting in. He was never good with the whole communication thing."

"Yeah, he was rather… quirky." I say.

"I could not stand the man. Going round all lurking, smelling like the mothballs. I thought you dead or turned. But… you killed Lothos. Well done you."

She takes a corner a bit hard and overshoots a little, I feel glad she chose a sturdy offroader. She merely sticks her tongue out the side of her mouth and pulls an expression like she is a child at a funfare.

"So what happens now?"

"Simple. We pick-up where Merrick left off. Train you properly. We just need to know where he left you."

She pulls up into town by Jessica's mom's cafe, breaking a little hard so we jolt forqard. Her bag rattles again as she grabs it up.

"So. Are you coming, Buffy Swan?"

…

Diana hates Buffalo wings it turns out, and after a mouthful she winces and pushes the whole basket toward me.

"Helvete da. No. No good. All for you." She says. "You look like you haven't been eating."

I shrug, and take one of wings. It doesn't look very appealing, but I take a bite anyway.

"Your dad does not know?" She says, blowing her hair out of her face as she looks through the menu.

"No. Well, not that it's all real. As far as he knows, I just had a mental break during high school and started imagining stuff. They put me in… mental hospital for a while."

"You told them about us?"

I felt uncomfortable with her gaze, and turned my attention back to the wings.

"That is okay" she shrugs. "They won't believe anyway. We just make the records go "poof". Easy fix."

Such a strange woman. Not at all what I expected. I had in my mind a stern English woman with a serious librarian vibe. Diana Cronquist looked more like a college girl, bookish but with a sense of lightness, creativity. I just couldn't picture her in her little pointy boots, loping through graveyards and hammering stakes into undead. But, I guess, I didn't exactly come across as all Victor VanHelsing myself.

"So, how does this work? Do I tell Charlie who you are?".

Diana looks at me over her glasses with her piercing green eyes, her freckled face still.

"Anyone you tell the truth to is in danger. You know this."

"So what? Hey, dad, oh don't mind Diana, she is just my Swedish nanny, she is gonna be teaching me kung-fu?"

"Don't be ridiculous. And I'm Norwegian. Mostly. A quarter Swedish. But, the simple answer is we don't need to tell him anything."

"By making me go "poof" too?" I say.

She smiles and looks back at the menu. "How do you like the idea of Italy?"

"As a concept?"

"As a new home."

"I… don't think I can just disappear Diana. Charlie and Mom… they…"

"I know, Buffy. But…"

"I am The Slayer. I think I get the deal."

"It's beautiful. The old cities. The culture. The food is amazing. The men so handsome. Just, think of it as a gap year… only… permanent."

I dumped the wing back into the basket.

"It's okay Diana. You don't need to sugar coat it. I go where people need me." I sigh and look out the window, across the lake, framed about with lush green forest. The morning mists are rising.

I think of mom, in a new town, alone, recently divorced, the news of her troubled daughter's disappearance, the days stretching to weeks, to years. No grave to mourn. Photos of me fading slowly on the mantle.

Of Charlie, unshaven, leading search after search for me into the wilderness, the search party getting smaller and smaller as hope of finding me slowly dies away.

I try not to think of Alice and Leah. Because I knew I could not stop from crying if I did.

I almost ask Diana if they can somehow fake my death so that everyone can have peace. I can picture her shrugging and nodding like it is nothing at all, but somehow it felt like I would be signing the death warrant on some innocent teenage girl out there, whose only crime was being my height and weight. I wondered what lengths The Watchers went to keep their secrets.

"Buffy?" Diana says, drawing my attention back.

"Okay." I say. "When do we leave?"

She flipped the menu over again without looking up.

"As soon as I find us both something decent to eat."