DISCLAIMER: I own Anni, Hopie, and "If you give a Vamp a Cracker." Everyone else is the property of Joss Whedon et al.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Finished with papers!!!!!!! YAY!!!!! Now those four pesky finals next week, but first a little break for some Hopie fluffiness. Oh, and can I mention the fact that I referenced 'Once More with Feeling' in my paper on Godard and the French New Wave in Cinema? Anyway, enjoy the fluffy goodness and please review.
Le Bella: Epilogue
The kindergarten classroom was very busy. All the little boys and girls were illustrating the special stories they had written for family night. Assistant teachers had helped them all to write down their stories. There were some very…interesting ones. Some of the children were so creative.
The teacher walked over to Hopie's desk, smiling at the way the little girl bit her bottom in concentration as she colored. She peered at the drawing and saw a stick figure with yellow hair.
"Is that your Daddy?" she asked Hopie.
Hopie shook her head. "That's Mr. Spike," she said. The teacher raised her eyebrows. Mr. Spike?
Hopie got a worried expression on her face.
'What's wrong, Hopie?" the teacher asked her. "Are you nervous about the play tonight? You have a very big part." The teacher was rather proud of her casting. Hopie looked so adorable in her costume.
"I'm not nervous," Hopie said, looking at her like she was crazy. Hopie had slayed vamps, and the teacher thought she was nervous about a silly little play?
"Then what?" the teacher asked.
"Is there room for my entire family to come tonight?" Hopie asked. "I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings by leaving them out."
"Of course there is," the teacher said, figuring that Hopie couldn't have more than one sibling. Her mother looked so young that the teacher doubted that Hopie could have a very big family yet. Hopie smiled a big smile and went back to illustrating the book.
Later that night, the kindergarten teacher's mouth dropped open as Hopie Chase Angel came in with an entourage of people, very few of whom looked older than 25. Dawn and Connor were grinning at each other like they were getting ready to go back to the cubby room and make out. Spike was glaring at them, and Buffy was poking him in the ribs. Faith and Lindsey were smiling at the way that Wes and Willow were holding hands, and Anni was holding Hopie's hands as the little girl jumped up and down, excitedly.
The teacher recognized Hopie's mother and guessed that the man next to him was Hopie's father, but she did not recognize the other people standing with her. Even Fred, Gunn, Anya, Xander, Giles, and Lorne had come. The teacher wondered why that one gentleman was wearing an overcoat, a hat, and a scarf that covered most of his face. Lorne winked at Hopie from underneath his disguise. She giggled.
"Hopie," the teacher said, "who are all of these people?"
"My family," Hopie replied. She introduced everyone. The teacher heard a lot of "Aunts" and "Uncles" and a few "Mr.'s," but she couldn't for the life of her figure out why Hopie's family all looked like they shouldn't even be out of college yet.
"Come on," Hopie said, pulling on Anni's hand. She motioned for Momma and Daddy to follow her. "Come see my desk!" There were so many of them that they had to move the other desk in order to see Hopie's.
She proudly showed them her work: her spelling and math, her shapes. They all oooo-ed and ahhhh-ed appropriately.
"What's this?" Anni asked curiously, picking up Hopie's story.
"That's my book," Hopie replied importantly. "I wrote it."
"If you give a Vamp a Cracker," Connor read the title and then grinned.
"Hey," Fred said, "you know that stick figure on the cover sort of looks like…"
"Spike," everyone said.
"Doesn't either," Spike said until he caught Hopie's frown. "Maybe a little bit," he conceded, trying to bring the smile back to the girl's face.
"You wrote this?" Xander asked, shooting a cocky look at Spike. Hopie nodded, a huge grin on her face.
"You read it," Hopie instructed, thrusting it at Giles. She liked his reading voice. It sounded nice and British.
"Very well," Giles said, adjusting his glasses. "If you Give a Vamp a Cracker, by Hopie Chase Angel." Hopie wriggled in anticipation. Giles opened the book to reveal the first page, with a drawing of a certain peroxide tinted vampire and a cracker with golden lines extending around it.
"That's because it tastes good," Hopie whispered to Anni.
"If you give a Vamp a cracker," Giles read, "he's going to want some blood." Giles turned the page. "If you give him some blood, he's going to need a napkin." Everyone laughed at the image of Spike with a blood mustache that Hopie had roughly drawn.
"Is that why you kept shoving those bloody crackers at me?" Spike asked, half amused, half outraged. Hopie nodded.
"Keep goin, Mr. Giles!" she squealed. Angel smirked at Spike, remembering that he had turned down the cracker.
"If you give him a napkin, he's going to need a trashcan," Giles read.
"Makes sense," Anya said. She peered at the picture. "That looks like the Magic Box," she said. "Were you drinking the blood from the fridge?" she accused Spike.
"If it's not there for me, I don't know why you have it," Spike retorted.
Anya shrugged. "You never know when you'll have to entertain a vampire." Xander shuddered at an unwanted memory when Anya said the word entertain. The reference floated over Anni's and Hopie's heads, but Dawn giggled.
Hopie poked Giles and he kept reading.
"If he throws away the napkin, he's ready to go fight." Fred thought that the logic there wasn't exactly sound and in the keeping with the words of the original book, but she didn't say anything because Hopie was, after all, just four years old.
"If he goes on patrol, he's going to be hungry. If he gets hungry, he's going to want a cracker. If you give a vamp a cracker, he's going to want some blood."
"That was a wonderful story," Willow told Hopie.
Hopie shook her head. "It's not over yet!" she cried. "The best part is the next part.
Giles turned the page. "If he drinks some more blood, he won't be able to get to sleep."
"Ain' t that the truth?" Spike muttered, thinking of the sleepless nights during Hopie's little cracker experiment. Then he smiled. Those sleepless nights with Buffy had actually been very… interesting. He grinned shamelessly at Buffy until he saw the impish grin on Hopie's face. She wouldn't have, he thought in horror. She couldn't have… she was just four years old.
"If he can't sleep, he will get bored." Picture of bored Spike. "If he gets bored, his slayer will come play with him." Everyone laughed at Hopie's picture of blonde Buffy and Spike smiling at each other.
Giles turned to the last page of the book. His face turned a little red, but he read the sentence out loud anyway. "If the slayer comes to play with him, they will have special grown up time. A lot. THE END."
Cordy looked at her little girl horrified, but she couldn't help it. She burst out laughing at the embarrassed look on Buffy's face. Soon everyone was laughing so hard that tears fell down their cheeks.
The teacher wondered what was so very funny and decided that it was no wonder that Hopie, though adorable, was just a bit odd.
"Okay boys and girls, time to get in your costumes for our play!" The teacher ushered the parents and random teenagers and twenty-somethings into the auditorium.
Soon the lights went out, and a little blonde girl walked onto stage.
"The Fairy Tale Tea," she said, announcing the name of their play. "Look," the little girl gestured widely, "it's Goldilocks and the Three Bears."
"Over-actor," Anya commented loudly. Everyone else in the group shushed her.
"She's, like, five, An," Xander whispered back.
"Five year olds can have talent," Anya commented again. Several of the other parents turned around to glare at her.
The children playing goldilocks and the three bears stumbled through their lines. Next up was Cinderella, then Snow White, and then finally, Hopie walked out onstage for the big finale. She was wearing a red cloak and carrying a large hand basket. Cordelia didn't know why, but she got a sinking feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach.
"Over the river and through the woods, to Grandmother's house I go," Hopie sang. Lorne's eyes opened widely, and he tried desperately to get Angel or Cordy's attention. They shushed him, beaming at their baby on stage.
Spike smacked Connor upside the head when he leaned in to kiss Dawn.
The kid playing the wolf came onto stage and talked to Hopie, and then with a quick change of scenery, Hopie was talking to the wolf dressed as her grandmother. The wolf's ears looked more a bunny's, but no one thought anything of it since the costumes were home made. Anya covered her eyes with her hands. Evil wolf-bunny hybrid, she thought.
"What big eyes you have, Grandmother!" Hopie said.
"The kid's a natural," Angel commented proudly.
"The better to see you with my dear," the boy playing the wolf growled back, his ears flopping around. Anya shrieked in horror, and Xander shushed her. Lorne tried again to get Angel's attention, and again he failed. Giving up, he just sat back to enjoy the show.
"What big ears you have, Grandmother!" Hopie said. The audience was enthralled. Most parents admitted to themselves that they had never seen a cuter child than the little black haired sprite up on stage.
"The better to hear you with, my dear," the little boy replied.
"What big teeth you have, Grandmother," Hopie said, inching her basket open a bit. In that instant, Cordelia gasped, knowing exactly what was going to happen. She started gesturing wildly to Hopie not to do it.
"So talented," Angel muttered, completely out of it, like the proud papa he was. "And so darn cute."
"The better to eat you with, my dear," the little boy said, moving towards Hopie like he was getting ready to pounce.
Before the woodcutter could come in to save her, Hopie pulled out her crossbow and aimed it firmly at the boy's chest.
"I don't think so," she replied. The little boy stood, frozen to his spot, and all heck broke loose in the auditorium.
"Take that, evil bunny-wolf!" Anya screamed.
Cordy and Angel both rushed toward the stage.
"Do you think our kids will be like that?" Faith asked Lindsey curiously.
"I hope so," Lindsey replied, grinning up at the stage.
"I hope so too," Faith replied. Hopie saw her Momma and Daddy coming, and she figured that it was a good thing she had left Bob at home.
OKAY PEOPLE… that's it, Le Bella, complete! Thanks to everyone who reviewed the entire time! Please let me know what you thought of the last chapter and the story overall and if you'd like to see a sequel.
I've got a basic plot in mind, so let me share. If you have any ideas, let me know!
It's called Things Unseen: Wes and Willow are just getting comfortable in their relationship and in being parents to Anni when the unthinkable happens. Lilah is pregnant, with Wes' child. When the Watcher's Council magically kidnaps the child from lilah's womb, all heck breaks loose. Good fluffiness too: the wedding, Hopie's imaginary friend, Spike on babysitting duty, Anni and boys…hehehe I can't wait. Let me know if you'll read the sequel. It prob won't be for a couple weeks, but keep your eyes pealed in case I write the first chapter or so as a study break!
Until then, I may do a couple of short vignettes with these characters just for fun. Look for them and if you want more, review!