Wednesday Evening

Buffy, Joyce, and Giles had done most of the standard
touristy things; they had taken the cable cars, walked down
the very curvy street, had lunch in Chinatown and coffee in
South Beach, and had shopped in Ghirardelli Square. Now
they were dining in a restaurant near Fisherman's Wharf.

"This is wonderful," said Giles. He had ordered a paella, Buffy a
baked salmon dish, and Joyce mahi-mahi, but soon they were busy
stealing portions of each other's dinner. "It's astonishing what
one can do with seafood. And, that garlic soup--"

"You won't have to worry about vampires tonight," said Joyce.

"I guess coming from England you aren't used to good food," said
Buffy. Joyce glared at her.

"I think it's the competition, Rupert. There are so many
restaurants here that a poor one could not survive long."

"How could you stand fish and chips, Giles?"

"I couldn't, Buffy. My father always thought that a lower class
food, and Council training stressed proper nutrition. Oil and
grease were right out."

"I wish I could tell Buffy that."

"You should look at Xander, Mom."

The waiter took their plates and they ordered dessert and
coffee. He soon returned with Giles' flan and Buffy and Joyce's
ice creams. After he left, Joyce said, "Well, Buffy, I hope
things will work out better for you now."

"I hope so too, Mom."

"I wonder what she'll be like?"

"Mom?" Buffy and Joyce exchanged nervous looks.

"Faith's replacement--what will she be like?"

Giles coughed, and Joyce turned to him. "Faith has no
replacement."

"What do you mean? She was called after Kendra--" Joyce looked
around and stopped talking; after all, they were in a public
restaurant.

"Joyce, Faith isn't--" Giles couldn't go on for the same reason.

"But you--" Joyce picked up a knife and made a stabbing motion,
and then mimed something falling off the edge of the table.

"Mom, she's in the hospital. The doctors don't think she'll ever
wake up."

"But she has to be--" Joyce couldn't say the word. "How else can
you be safe?" They finished their dessert in silence, paid their
check, and took a taxicab to the subway station.

---

Willow and Oz had awakened mid-afternoon. Neither of them were in
any mood for lovemaking, and they got up and dressed in their
emergency post-Slaying outfits. They went into her living room
and went back to their tasks of planning the service. Oz made
some phone calls and took some notes, and Willow stared at her
computer.

"What's wrong, babe?"

"I don't know what to say. I know I have to give a speech, but I
don't know what to say."

Oz drummed his pencil against the table for a moment. "Trust
your heart. But remember, the speech is supposed to be about
them."

She nodded. After a moment, she nodded again, turned to her
computer, and started to type.

Oz phoned up Devon; after a long bargaining session, he managed
to persuade Devon to participate in the service. They spoke for
a few minutes about what they'd play there, and then he hung up.

Willow's hands flew over the keys of the computer; she could play
a keyboard far better than he could his guitar. He looked as
paragraphs took shape and were dismissed, as menus danced and
words swayed. Willow saw nothing but the monitor, he knew. The
other students had disparaged her and dismissed her for her
interests, for her efforts, for the concentration she applied to
each of her tasks, for the enthusiasm they considered
inappropriate. He loved her for all those things, and yes for her
body also.

Oz picked up his guitar and strummed a few chords; soon he
started to play a mournful tune, a lament for those they had
lost. Friends, enemies, and bystanders--it mattered little to
him. Each had some value to the world, and each deserved a
memorial. Soon he too was lost in concentration.

He reentered the world before she did; the body enforces its own
limits, and he went to the kitchen to satiate his hunger. He came
back with a sandwich and juice for her; ten minutes later, she
looked aside and noticed them.

"Thanks."

"Welcome, babe."

He picked up his guitar again while she devoured her food. He
was playing the tune he had improvised before when she asked him,
"Playing that at the service?"

Oz nodded, and she listened. After he finished she said, "Sounds
good. It's from the heart."

"I'll tweak it a bit, but it'll do. Do you need an extra pair of
eyes?"

"Nice to have a proofreader. I always miss a typo."

Oz put their dishes in the dishwasher, and the two of them
consulted over the computer screen, their heads touching, arguing
over commas and dangling participles, syntax and connotation. As
they were working, Mr. and Mrs. Rosenberg walked into the house
and sat down at the kitchen table. They did not notice.

Around ten o'clock, they finally got up from the computer, their
concentration shot.

"Time, Will?"

"Time for us, yes."

Both somewhat dizzy, they stumbled their way toward Willow's
room.

"And where are you going?" interrupted Mr. Rosenberg.

Willow and Oz turned toward him; both of them were calm, though
in Willow's case it was the calm of exhaustion.

"We're going to bed."

"You and this boy, in our house? Sheila, come here. Do you know
about this, Sheila?"

"That's Oz, Ira. Willow and Oz have been dating for a few
months."

"A year, Mom. Over a year."

"And they're sleeping together, Sheila? How long has that been
going on?"

"Oh, they'd never do that. Willow knows how dangerous that
is. All research shows that the longer girls wait, the better
their lives are."

"Mom, listen to me. We are going to bed. We were--we are going to
have sex."

"Get over there and sit down." Willow and Oz sat down on the
living room loveseat, Sheila Rosenberg sat on the couch, and Ira
Rosenberg stood on the other side of the coffee table, looking
like a county prosecutor. "So, how long has this been going on?
How long have you been sneaking around behind our backs?"

Willow seemed to collapse inward upon herself, and then Oz
reached to her and squeezed her shoulder. Suddenly she stood up,
her eyes flashing with anger, and Ira Rosenberg took a step
backwards. "This? We have been dating for over a year, but that's
not what you were asking. And, we've been together that
way--having sex--for the last week. I wish we'd started
earlier. And sneaking around? How unnecessary is that? We don't
have to sneak around you because you don't see anything."

"You're our little girl, Willow. We care about you," said Sheila.

"Only theoretically, Mother. You look at your studies and your
parenting journals, and you decide what would be best for the
typical girl of my age. Well, I'm not a datum in a paper; you
can't reduce me to numbers and statistics. And I am not a little
girl."

"And you, what do you have to say for yourself, young man?"

Oz stood up. "Willow speaks for both of us. I would never insult
her by trying to speak for her." Willow turned to Oz and took his
hand.

"And what do you mean about that last statement, Willow? We don't
see anything?" asked Ira.

"You don't see anything. Do you know what we've been doing for
the last few days or months or years? Do you care that the school
blew up, or that we've had friends die? I shouldn't even bother
mentioning that you two didn't bother visiting me in the hospital
last year."

Sheila and Ira looked at each other and shook their heads; they
hadn't remembered.

"But sex, Willow? Do you know what happens to immature teenage
girls who get themselves in too deep? They end up submerged in
their boyfriends' lives, lessened in every way," said Sheila.

"Immature?" Oz chuckled.

"Immature? Lessened?" Willow's tone went high and a bit squeaky,
but she took a deep breath and returned to an even, forceful
voice. "Oz has never tried to make me be any less than I can
be. Oz would never try to squeeze me into a box, to treat me as a
thing. He loves me, all of me. I love him, all of him. He
couldn't ever try to restrict me."

"Look at you; you could have gone to a good school, like Harvard,
or Yale, or U. Chicago. Instead, you're following your boyfriend
to the local rinky-dink college," said Ira.

"So I could have gone to one of your precious Ivies and be like
you? I'll pass. I have good reasons for going to UCS, and it
isn't because of Oz."

"What is it, then? Are you following your friend Bunny around?
That violent troublemaker? She's a bad influence on you." Oz
slammed his hand down on the coffee table.

"That's Buffy, Mother. Buffy Summers. And without her, I'd be the
timid mouse I was three years ago. Do you know what Buffy means
to us, to everyone in our school, to everyone in this town?
Buffy, a troublemaker? She stops trouble, not starts it."

"You are not going to insult Buffy around us. You don't have the
right. Willow, let's go."

"Let's." They walked past her parents to get their things from
her room, and Ira and Shelia followed them. As they were packing,
Willow said with a disgusted voice, "Do you know what we did
today? We buried a brave man who could have been a friend. So we
were going to comfort each other in bed. We were going to have
sex, for comfort, for love, and yes, for lust. If there ever are
good reasons for two people to go to bed, those are. Now we
won't, because now it would be for anger, and Oz won't ever do
that."

Willow had put her clothes in her overnight bag, and then she
opened her weapons bag. "Need some, Oz?" Oz nodded, and she
pulled a couple of stakes out and tossed them to him. He placed
them in his pockets. They marched past her parents to the living
room, grabbed her laptop and his guitar, and left. Sheila and Ira
Rosenberg watched them drive off in Oz's van, completely
stunned. Soon, they turned to each other, and Shelia wept.

They arrived at Oz's house ten minutes later. The two of them
went in and rushed to his room, waving at Oz's parents watching
television in the den. Oz's parents waved back, Oz's mother
mumbling, "It figures."

The two dropped their bags and sat on his bed. "How do you feel,
Will?"

"Vile. Almost as bad as when I cast the Restoration spell."

"'Only theoretically, Mother.' Good line."

"I think it's been two years since I had a real conversation with
them."

"I'm glad I don't know the feeling."

"Yeah."

"Will, do you still want to?"

"Oz?"

"I don't want to let them ruin it for us."

"I would if you would. Oh, yes."

---

"How do you live here, Xander? This basement stinks."

"Why do you think I'm going away?"

---

On the train to Berkeley, Joyce tried to speak, but she looked at
the other people on the train and lapsed back into silence. Buffy
whispered in Giles' ear, "What do I say? 'Sorry I only put Faith
in a coma,' seems off." Giles whispered back that he'd try to
find out what Joyce was thinking, and they waited through the
rest of the ride.

They got out at the Berkeley station, and they took a taxi to
their hotel. When they got to their rooms, Buffy picked up a bag,
said she had a date with a punching bag, and walked out. Giles
went into his room, and Joyce threw herself onto one of her
beds. A few minutes later, Joyce knocked on the connecting door
to Giles' room, and he let her in.

"I'm sorry, Rupert."

"Joyce."

"I just assumed that she was dead. I mean, Buffy's very good at
what she does." Giles made a noise of agreement. "So, you told me
she stabbed Faith, and I just thought--"

"I am sorry I gave you that impression, Joyce."

"Will she ever wake up?"

"The doctors don't think so, but they don't know a Slayer's
capabilities. I sneaked a look at her chart, and even I can't
tell you."

"And how long will she last?"

"I don't know that either."

"Damn."

The conversation halted for a few minutes; no form of awkwardness
could escape the Slayer's Mother and the Slayer's
Watcher. Finally, Joyce spoke a coherent sentence again.

"The thing is--what do you think of me?"

"Excuse me?"

"Suppose I weren't Buffy's Mom. What would you think of me?"

Giles considered his words carefully. "Joyce? If I had walked
into your gallery, I would have noticed the handsome woman
proprietor."

"Handsome?"

"We're both too old for pretty. Pretty is for teenagers like
Ripper and Joycie."

"Don't sell us short."

"We might have talked for a bit, but I'm not particularly good at
chatting women up."

"Look at me! The only man I've dated in the last few years tried
to kill my daughter."

"There's something you should know about Ted."

"I'm not going to like this, will I?"

"I'm afraid not."

"Well, tell me. It's too late now."

"He wasn't human."

"Huh? I saw him in the sun; he wasn't a vampire."

"No, he was a robot."

Joyce was quiet for a moment and then she slumped into a
chair. "It figures. Life in the Twilight Zone."

"Don't feel bad, Joyce. Willow and Xander have had similar
experiences."

"And Buffy."

Giles didn't answer that; his feelings toward Angel were still
too raw for him to speak about. "In the end, Joyce, our lives are
too different. Were it not for your daughter, there would be no
connection between us."

"Exactly."

They both stopped talking again.

---

Buffy had taken some of her frustrations out on the hotel
punching bag; a young boy had looked up at her and said, "You're
good." She smiled back. Now, she walked catlike to the room and
opened the door quietly, in case her mother was asleep. No one
was in the room, and she frowned.

Soon, she heard voices from Giles' room. She fell victim to her
curiosity, and she listened at the connecting door.

Joyce started speaking again. "The thing is, even if we wanted to
date, we couldn't."

"Because of Buffy?"

"Because of Buffy. I don't care that she'd be going 'Ewwww!' all
the time. But, she will always be the most important person in
your life; I'd always be in second place. I'm glad of that--she
needs an honorable man behind her. But, I'd always be an
afterthought."

"Oh, Jenny," thought Buffy. "He never gets a break, does he?
Eep!"

Giles just nodded; Joyce was right.

"The thing is, I look at you--you're a brave, nice man. You'd be
a great husband and father. But, you're in my worst nightmares."

"Joyce?"

"Rupert, do you know how often I have nightmares of Buffy going
out to battle and not coming back? Of you telling me that my
daughter is dead?"

Giles rose from the bed and stood next to her chair. He leaned
down and said in a husky voice, "I'd die for her."

"I know." Joyce gripped his arms and looked up at him; tears
flowed down her face. Tears flowed down Buffy's face too.

After a minute, Joyce started speaking again. "Then, when I found
out about Faith, I hoped she would help. I was selfish; I hoped
she'd take over completely, that Buffy would be able to
retire. And now, she tried to kill my daughter. Why?"

"She didn't have anyone like you, Joyce. Life wounded her, and
Slaying gave her the power to wound back. In the end, we couldn't
reach her."

"And now, Buffy's the only one. They'll keep coming after her;
sooner or later they'll gang up on her, or someone will get the
idea of using a gun, or running her over, or burning the house
down. She'll never be safe."

Giles said weakly, "Vampires tend not to use guns or cars; it's a
blind spot."

"Still. That's why I said that about Faith's replacement; I hoped
that whomever was called next could take over, and give Buffy
peace."

"I don't think, Joyce--" Joyce rose from her chair and started
pacing.

"Now, she might last years like that; years for Buffy to battle
on her own."

"Never on her own, Joyce."

Joyce wasn't listening. "Or she might wake up, and then she'd try
to kill Buffy again." Giles didn't respond; he was scared of what
Joyce might say.

"Rupert, that's why we have to kill her."

Giles stared at her in shock, and then he took a breath and said,
"What? No, Joyce. We don't kill human beings, no matter what the
provocation."

"Your damn Council was willing." Right then, they heard a loud
bang from the connecting door. Giles quickly went to the door,
and they heard another bang from it. Giles unlocked and opened
the door, and Buffy ran inside.

"You're off your form, Buffy."

"Yeah, well, I didn't want us to pay the repair bill." She glared
at her mother and said, "No, Mom. Stop right there. What are you
saying?"

Joyce tried to glare back at her daughter, but it was useless;
she could not propose murder and claim parental authority. She
sank to her knees and laid her head upon the bed. "It was the
only way to keep you safe, to let you quit." Joyce's voice was
weak and breathy.

Buffy cut off what she had been about to say and just looked at
her mother; Joyce seemed utterly defeated. Buffy gently lifted
her onto the bed; her mother's weight was nothing to her.

"Mom. Mom. Mommy." Joyce looked up at Buffy's last word; it had
been years since she'd heard it last. "Mom, it's okay. I'm
not--we're not going to let them win." Buffy extended an arm
toward Giles. "Me and Giles, and Willow, and Xander, and
Oz--we'll make our own destinies. We've never obeyed the rules,
and we won't lay down and die no matter what demons or vampires
or watchers say. And we'll find some way to end this system."

A light seemed to glow in Buffy's face; she had the look that
mesmerized the demonic form of Mayor Wilkins, that caused fire
demons to run from her, and that cowed whole hosts of
vampires. And looking at her, Joyce could almost believe
her. Buffy and Joyce embraced, and Buffy led Joyce back into
their room.

---

"What on earth is that noise?" Willow heard a sound like a bird's
coo from somewhere inside Oz's house. Oz leaned over her and
listened.

"That's Mom."

"Mom?"

"What do you know--Cordy was right yesterday."

"What? Oh. That's rare."

Oz shushed her with a finger and bent himself toward her breasts.

---

"What on earth is that noise?"

"A beer bottle smashing against a wall, I think."

"Xand, do you think they ever loved each other?"

"I think they loved each other when they got married, but they
haven't for a long time. Not since I was born. I think that tore
it for Dad at least. A busted career, and another mouth to
feed. Trapped. That's when he really picked up the bottle. And he
thought it was all my fault just for being born."

"Idiots. Him for thinking that and you for believing him."

"And Mom--she and Dad would fight, and she'd run to her sister's,
but she'd always come back. She could have left; she could have
taken us away, but she stayed with Dad. And she picked up the
bottle too. In the end, she's a coward."

"Which is why you try to be absurdly brave. Tell me again--why am
I here?"

"Because your family is screwed up as mine, only in a rich sort
of way."

"Uh-huh. I guess they couldn't love each other. They only love
things. And I learned from them." She spat out the word, "Fakes!"

They heard a crash from upstairs. "Your place tomorrow?"

"Yeah."

---

"Mom, you know I can't quit, don't you?"

"I know, hon." They turned off their lights, and they settled
into fitful sleeps.