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Stops and Starts
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Things had gone slightly downhill the rest of the night. The actual band members had been nice and friendly the entire time. Spike had even engaged Dawn in a technical discussion, and seemed to be warming to them while she proved herself knowledgeable of Pearl's Masters MSX RetroSpec.

Anya and Willow had also been cordial in the extreme. Actually, the only real source of tension was wearing a stupid red sequined tube top.

"That was very childish."

"Spike, whatever could you mean?"

Spike shifted in his seat. He could never get comfortable in these stupid miniature vinyl-upholstered bucket seats. But he'd left his car at the warehouse when he'd ridden over with Xander, so he had to endure Sam's ridiculous tiny coup on the way back.

"You. Getting all arched back and hissing in the poor girls' faces."

She snorted. "Right. The poor, innocent cherubs. I'm hardly at fault, here."

"What are you talking about? You were completely antagonistic the entire evening."

"Maybe," she said slowly, "because someone failed to warn me about my enemies."

Spike whapped the dashboard. "They're not your enemies! They're - bleedin' allies in the quest for fame and fortune!"

Sam nodded reasonably, and put on her turning signal. "Is that right. Silly me to view the two beautiful women you've chosen to live with in close quarters while I'm hundreds of miles away with suspicion."

"Sam, don't be daft..."

The car stopped abruptly, and Spike looked around in confusion and realized that She'd driven them into a Walgreens parking lot. Sam carefully put the car in Park and pulled the brake, then whirled around to face him.

"Daft? Am I being 'daft,' William? You never call me, we never go out. Hell, we haven't slept together in weeks. Am I being crazy to worry that you're seeing someone else?"

He sighed. "Pet, I'm not seeing someone else."

"No?" Sam grabbed his chin and forced him into the eye contact he'd been avoiding all night. "But you're not seeing me. Are you?"

There was a long, silent moment, which was used both for plumbing the depths of soul and wondering what to do next.

Spike broke it and Sam's grip at the same time.

"Sam, maybe it would be better for both of us if..."

She nodded vigorously and turned around in her seat. "Yes, I think it would. Get out of the car."

Spike blinked. "What?"

She pulled the brake and shifted into Reverse.

"Get out. Of my car. Now, before I pull out my pepper spray."

He yanked at his seatbelt and fumbled for the door handle. He failed to locate it, and squinted at the door. "Where's the bloody--"

"Now! Get out of my car! Get OUT OF MY CAR!"

The late night counter attendant watched with the interest of the very bored as a blonde man was thrown out of the parked red sports coup and onto the asphalt. He had to scramble back to avoid being run over as the coup hurtled backwards and y-turned out of the parking lot. The attendant took a step to his left for a better angle.

The black clad blonde stood in the parking lot for a minute or so, staring after the car, before abruptly jabbing his middle fingers into the sky and screaming, --audibly, even through the double glass-- "F YOU, BITCH!"

Then he turned and headed for the store.

The attendant continued to watch with growing unease as the man had a brief scuffle with the folding automatic doors and stomped up to the register.

"M-may I help you?" Now that there wasn't reinforced glass between them, the glint in his eyes was less entertaining and more worrying. The attendant reached under the counter for the hand gun.

"Yeah, I need'ta use your telephone," the man said blandly.

The attendant grabbed the phone and pushed it towards him. "Anything else, sir?"

"Yeah," Spike said. "Which aisle's the Tylenol?

****
Three days later...
****

"Ugh. Where's the Tylenol?"

"They're all gone," Dawn muttered, digging in her purse.

Buffy rolled her head over to squint up at her bag-eyed sister.

"Advil?"

"Un-uh."

"Any drug at all to make the pain stop?"

"Just go get high on dope, Buffy. All I've got are some Nyquil and nose spray. Ooh! Cough drops."

A paper-wrapped lozenge was dropped onto the table in front of Buffy's eyes. She squinted at it.

"Is this cherry?"

"No. Honey lemon."

"Oh!" Buffy brightened, and even sat up in the uncomfortable fold out chair as she struggled to unwrap the cough drop.

After a minute or so, Oz yawned and asked, "You want some help with that?"

She turned to him, slightly embarrassed. "Uh, could you? For some reason, my eyes are all bleary..."

"That would be the last three days of twenty-four hour tour preparations," he mumbled, taking the cough drop from her and picking at the waxed down edges.

"Does that also account for the throbbing headache, and painful empty feeling in my stomach?"

Oz tried to focus on the wrapper. Stupid-- "Well, that's actually the sleep and sustenance depravation, but those are both byproducts of the tour prep, so yeah."

Buffy hit her head against the table. "Oh goodie," she mumbled into her arms.

Beside her, Oz finally got the lozenge unwrapped and placed it neatly on the table in front of her.

"Cough drop is served."

Three fingers poked out of the cradle of her arms to snag the treat, then disappeared again. Over her head, Dawn and Oz shared a look.

"She's not coping very well, is she?" Dawn asked.

"Don't worry. Spike gets like this the first few days of the tour, too." They both looked over at the couch, across which Spike was sprawled. He'd collapsed there about ten minutes ago, and he hadn't so much as twitched since.

It had been a rough few days. The photoshoot, which had, indeed, been for just a few shots, had somehow stretched into late afternoon. After that the sisters had rushed to the record store to pick up the CDs they needed to get their parts from, and had practiced long into the night, trying to get prepared enough not to embarrass themselves at the rehearsal the next day.

Since the rehearsal had started around nine that morning, this turned out to be not the best of plans. It was scheduled --loosely, as were all things planned by the male members of the band itself-- to end at noon. But there had been some trouble with the lighting sync, so after three tense and mostly fruitless hours, they'd breaked for lunch and then reconvened to try again.

When Spike had first been witness to the sound explosion that was Buffy's take on 'Amends,' he'd dropped his guitar.

A runner had been sent out for a new strap.

Buffy and Dawn had both messed up at some point, but so had Spike and Oz. Xander, with his three keyboards, was the only one with an unblemished record at the end of the rehearsal. There was a sense that there was more to be done, but that was a pretty prevalent feeling at the moment anyway. There was always something more to be done. And not much time to do it. A lot of it was waiting.

The next morning, that morning, in fact, Dawn and Buffy had gone shopping. Anya had informed them that they'd need a wardrobe of 'stage clothes' for the road. Not entirely unenthusiastically, they'd gone off in search of lots of black in many pretty shapes. The only problem with that was that both the girls had now cycled through the 'shopping high' and into the deep trenches of exhaustion on the other side. Dawn was faring far better than Buffy.

She claimed it was the Powerbars.

She had just located her last one in the depths of her purse and grumpily identified it as peanut butter when the door to the dressing room opened, and the irritatingly cheery Xander strode in, followed by an equally perky Anya.

"Greetings, Romans, Bards and Village People! You guy's ready? Most of the press is assembled, and it's officially time to strap those bells on." He looked around the room, noticing the lack of any energy. "What's the matter with you guys?"

He took in Buffy's slumped torso curled over the table. He Looked at Dawn. "Is she hung over?"

"Just a victim of the nonstop party that is show business," Oz answered. "Much in the style of our esteemed comrade."

Xander turned to see Exhibit B sprawled across the couch. "Oh, I remember this now..."

"Luckily, we come bearing revivitory beverages!" Anya bounced over to the couch and held the tray under Spike's nose. It twitched.

Dawn leaned towards Oz. "Why are they so alive?" she whispered.

"Xander lives next door to a Starbucks. That is not their first expresso tray today."

Buffy's head shot up, nearly colliding with Dawn's. "Starbucks?"

"Starbucks..." Spike sat up, more slowly than Buffy but at least he was moving. He reached for the steam-spewing paper cups, but Anya drew them back.

"You'll all get the nice coffee when you get to the conference room. Come on... Can't you smell the bitter yet flavorful, estate-brewed, custom roasted, steaming hot house blend plus almond?" She started walking slowly backwards. Spike stumbled to his feet, his entire focus centered on the retreating tray.

"Mneah..." he moaned.

"This is no good," Xander said. "He's gonna have to talk for at the press conference."

"It's coming. Verbals come after motor skills," Anya replied. "Come on," she beckoned. "Come get the niiiiice coffee. There's some for everybody. And one of them's a mo-cha..." Oz stuttered to his feet, staring intently at the tray.

$$$$$$

It's just sick how many Walgreens there are in the world. The Forestry and Wildlife Service needs to approve a Walgreens Season, to keep the population down so they don't screw up the city ecosystems.

Can't you just imagine Elmer Fudd In his dork-ass hat hiding behind a Toyota Camry in a parking lot, going, "Shh! I'm hunting Walgweens!"

...I just made myself spew soda all over my computer screen.

And Kay: keyboards can be set up to synthesize other instruments (hence the nickname, 'synth'), such as strange Linkin Parkish computer noises, guitar, organ effects, additional drumbeat, and sometimes even piano! The keyboardist is truly a rad dude.

Heaven above, save us from the keytars.

~Star Mouse


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