"Buffy! Buffy it's the dream. It's not real. Come on. Come back to me, Buffy."
She woke with a jolt, aware first that strands of hair were stuck to her face with sweat, next that there were tears in her eyes, and lastly that Giles was gripping her shoulder almost hard enough to bruise.
She took a deep, ragged breath, willing her heart to calm the fuck down.
Giles released her, slumping sideways against the headboard with an audible sound of relief. "I take it the screaming is new?"
Before she could answer, Buffy was wracked with a violent shiver. Giles sat back up, packing the blanket in around her, his face set with deep concern. He smoothed the hair away from her face, passing his knuckles gently across her forehead and then her cheeks.
"I'm ok," she croaked out, cleared her throat and tried again. "I'm ok. Thank you."
Giles's hand dropped away, a flash of something akin to guilt washing over his face then disappearing. "Of course."
"I mean, I'm getting really really tired of this dream. But I'm not, you know. I'm not a little kid. You don't need to. You know." Wrong side of the bed, nightmare-having Buffy was not an articulate Buffy.
"I'm aware you're not a child. Haven't been for some time. That doesn't mean I can't still… care for you. If you'll let me."
Once again discomfited by the mild rawness of his admission, Buffy fell back into more familiar territory. "Oh come on, you just want the fresh, juicy dream details."
His smile was a quick thing but it buoyed her. Especially after losing him to the darkness yet again in her sleep. She scooted over and patted the bed next to her. He took the invitation, stretching his long legs out beside hers and leaning back against the lush pillows.
He kept a very nice guest room, as it turned out. And Buffy had taken a small, private satisfaction in noting that there was nothing in it to suggest that Faith was a regular occupant.
"It was the same as the others. Graveyard, lecturing, sassiness courtesy of yours truly. I trip and fall and you, um, you help." Buffy felt her face heat slightly. This was the part she still couldn't bring herself to share. Here he was literally in bed with her and she couldn't tell him that her dream self wanted to take that 'literal' and make it metaphorical too. She was suddenly keenly aware of how close their limbs were to touching. And how much more contact she actually wanted.
As she related the rest of the dream, she let herself lean against his shoulder. He eventually lifted one arm to wrap gingerly around her. Her voice stuttered slightly as she snuggled closer. This wasn't normal. Cuddling in bed was not a thing they did. Not to mention that she was still incredibly angry with him over the whole slayer-killing debacle from months ago. Among other past hurts that had never fully healed.
But he was so solid and warm and real. Her touch didn't pass through him like a ghost. Going on too many nights in a row, she'd lost him. Perhaps she could be forgiven for craving a little extra closeness.
"I don't know if I've been screaming before though. I have woken up with a sore throat a couple times but I guess I didn't make the connection," she concluded.
"No one has... woken you up?"
"My suite in the castle is pretty big. Boss privileges. And Dawn is away at school so it's mostly been me, myself and I."
"Ah."
Buffy sat up slightly to look at him. "What do you mean by 'ah'?"
He looked taken aback. "I don't suppose I meant anything. Other than acknowledgment."
"I don't really have time to date these days, you know," she reminded him, needlessly. He probably didn't know, really. But he also didn't need to know. And she wasn't sure exactly why this all suddenly mattered. She leaned back against the headboard, arms crossed over her chest.
"I. Um. I'm sure your duties keep you very occupied." His answer was measured and polite. After a long pause, he added, "I have no such excuse and still don't seem to, uh, find the time."
They lapsed into silence.
"This is weird, isn't it," she said, without looking at him.
"Yes."
"Why were you making dinner for Faith?" The words flowed out into the space between them before Buffy could seem to stop them.
"I wasn't. I was just making dinner and Faith happened to stop by on her way to… wherever it is she goes at night." There was a slight edge to his voice but at least he wasn't closing her out.
Buffy decided to press on. Genies out of bottles etc etc etc. "So she just casually stops by? Now that you two are, what, murder buddies or whatever?"
Giles exhaled loudly, shifting to look at her, his knee now pressing into her outer thigh. "Is that what you wanted to be? Would you rather I'd called on you to take out a rogue slayer? A human girl?"
"I'd have said no," she informed him, coldly.
"And it must be very nice to have the luxury of that choice."
Buffy's jaw dropped and she twisted to glare at him directly. "Oh yes, my life has been an absolute cornucopia of choice! I've been able to make all the wild and untethered decisions I want. Not like I've been chained by Prophecy, destiny, or fate or anything! No! I've just waltzed through with no responsibilities weighing on these slim but shapely shoulders!"
"I never said you haven't ever had your hand forced," he countered, "but surely you've noticed the ripple effect it has on those around you."
"Oh, well it's a good thing you've been able to escape the tidal wave so often. Hate to see you get all sucked under on account of how everything around Buffy just ends up… sucking!" She fought through the metaphor as it was collapsing in on itself and finally just gave up, pushing herself from the bed with a noise of frustration.
Giles gave a dry, humorless laugh and rose also, tightening his robe. "And we come back to that. Well, go on. You've clearly wanted to tell me before what an utter shite I was for leaving. Get it off your chest. I may be a marked man so there's no time like the present." He spread both arms wide.
"Y'know of the two of us, I think I'm really the one who has actually earned the martyr complex," she observed acerbically.
His arms dropped immediately to his sides. "I have made sacrifices, Buffy. More than you can know."
"Maybe because you never fucking tell me anything!" She took one step closer with each of the last few words. "You make all these decisions and plans and you just go right ahead like we aren't supposed to be a team. Like all that time with me. With us. With the Scoobies. Like none of it even matters the minute the Mighty Giles gets a big bright idea. And you even tried to lecture me on teamwork but you're just…you're a hypocrite!" Unshed tears were filling her eyes, making her voice thick but she pressed on, needing to let it out, give voice to the fear. "You say you still care for me but what does that even mean if I can't trust you?"
Giles looked as though she'd struck him, jaw slack and eyes full of hurt. He took an audibly shaky breath and turned to sit back down at the foot of the bed. "I can't. Buffy I can't do this with you. Not. Not like this." Another shaky breath, this one hitching partway through. "Please. Can we just." He shook his head and buried his face in both hands.
She hated the way she was already itching to reach out to him, to offer comfort that he didn't really deserve. All she'd done was speak the truth. A truth that had been burning in her gut for much longer than the most recent incident. Since he'd tried to aid the murder of her former lover. Since he'd helped lead the mutiny that got her booted from her own home. Since he'd abandoned her to the horror of being newly resurrected as a broke, barely legal adult with a teenager to raise. Maybe even since he'd injected her with those drugs from the council and kept it secret until it was almost too late.
Memory after memory clawed through her mind, even the things she thought she had forgiven or moved past. It was all still there, etched so deep in her heart. The tears came now of their own volition and she turned away from Giles and his shaking shoulders. She braced one hand against the wall, sorely tempted to punch her other hand through it. It didn't matter what was behind the wallpaper, she just needed to feel something break.
It was several very long moments before she started to come back to the present. By that point, she was sitting on the floor, her head tipped back against the wall (left unpunched, which she counted as a sign of maturity).
To her surprise, Giles hadn't left. He was still at the foot of the bed, looking decidedly worse for wear and sneaking peaks at her over his shoulder.
"You're still here." Her voice came out a little cracked but stronger than she'd expected.
He shifted so he could look at her without twisting. "After all that talk of my abandonment, it seemed the wisest choice." His voice was also rougher than normal. "I can, of course, go if that's what you'd like." He stood, a little unsteadily.
Buffy shook her head slowly, the coolness of the wall a welcome contrast to her flushed skin. "I don't know what I want, Giles. But I know I don't want to feel like this. Not now. Not ever again." She took a breath. "And especially not about you."
"God, I'd like that too," he breathed, then took a couple of hesitant steps toward her. When he was close enough, he extended a hand to help her up.
She took it and relief suffused his features. At her full height she still had to tip her head up to keep meeting his eyes. With Slayer sight, she could almost make out their color even in just the moonlit room. She'd always known those eyes anywhere, even when he'd been a demon. The warmth and intelligence there, the way they softened just for her. She found herself leaning toward him, locked into his gaze.
Giles's lips parted, his throat bobbing as she drew closer.
Heat rose into her face, of an entirely different kind than her previous anger. She was reminded that she was still holding his hand when she felt Giles brush his thumb over her knuckles. Feeling a little breathless, she squeezed his hand lightly in response.
His pupils widened.
Oh. Oh no. It was just like the dream. Only a million times worse because her whole body was suddenly alight with the knowledge that she genuinely wanted this man. In ways she had never even imagined before. Except maybe once or twice as a passing thought. Her mentor, her teacher, her sometimes teammate, her friend. She wanted to taste his lips, feel his body against hers, feel him move inside her. She wanted to know what sounds he made, if any, at the height of his pleasure and how those calloused fingers would feel as they mapped her flesh.
Overwhelmed, she closed her eyes, head tipping into his chest where a patch of curly hair tickled her nose, just at the vee of his robe. She breathed in his scent. His hand tightened around hers.
He made no move to either push her away or pull her closer though she could hear his heartbeat pick up its pace.
What the hell was wrong with her? Was she really that hard up? Or maybe it was a spell? No magic residue had been detected when she checked back in Scotland. She didn't feel drugged or any kind of floopy (aside from just tired and wrung out). So there was a good chance this was all… organic. 100% pure Buffy brand lust. Which somehow made it so much worse.
"Buffy? Are you…?"
She liked the rumble of his voice that she could feel from his chest. But she also noted that it sounded… strained.
Right. Because they didn't do things like this.
Reluctantly, she pulled away. "Tired. Just. You know, exhausted." It was hard to look at him right now and maintain the fib so she busied herself rearranging the covers and getting back under them. "We'll talk tomorrow, right?"
"I think it actually is tomorrow but, um, yes. Of course. Get some rest."
"You too." She burrowed down into the blankets and pillows, shutting her eyes tight. She could hear him shuffling out of the room. He stopped once at the door before continuing on into the hall where she heard his bedroom door open and shut.
Her eyes flew open, staring unseeingly at the ceiling. "Well. Fuck."