Part 5
Giles, Angel, and another man that Xander didn't recognize were standing in one of the waiting rooms when Xander finally returned to the hospital. His trip home had taken longer than planned, but after the conversation with Willow, he'd needed some time to himself. He knew that Willow was acting out of her own grief, but her actions were still completely uncalled for. How she could blame Buffy for Oz's death was beyond Xander's comprehension. Now he had the unfortunate task of informing Angel of what he'd learned.
"Hey, I brought food," Xander said as he walked toward the group holding a bag a bagels and three coffees. He didn't know who the third man was, but he assumed that he must be a doctor considering he was wearing a white coat.
"Thank you, Xander. Anything has got to be better than the swill they serve here," Giles replied, taking a cup from the holder. He wasn't normally a coffee drinker, but he supposed the caffeine would do him good today.
Giles frowned when Angel completely ignored the offered food and drink. "Angel, you really should have something to eat."
"I'm not hungry," Angel mumbled. Though he'd never admit it, he was thoroughly exhausted, but there was no way he could go to sleep anytime soon.
Grabbing a coffee and a bagel, Giles shoved them into Angel's hands. "You WILL eat, or I will not allow you to stay here!"
"Fine!" snapped Angel, hastily taking a bite of the bagel while glaring at his uncle.
Xander almost laughed at the ever independent Angel caving in to Giles' order. He held back his mirth, knowing it was inappropriate considering the situation. Secretly, he was glad Giles had forced the issue. Angel looked haggard, the lack of sleep and food starting to catch up to him. He knew it was unlikely that Angel would leave the hospital anytime soon, but at least they could get him to eat.
The room lapsed into relative silence while Angel and Xander ate, and Giles and the unknown man chatted in whispered tones. Xander waited until Angel had finished before deciding to bring up his conversation with Willow. He didn't want to do it while Angel had throwable objects in his hands.
"I saw Willow this morning," he finally uttered.
Angel eyed Xander, sensing something ominous in the tone of his friend's voice. He was about to speak when Giles looked up from the paperwork he'd been reading through. Removing his glasses, Giles closed the file and started to turn toward the door.
"Well, we will leave you two. As soon as we have an update on Buffy we'll let you know," he relayed, glancing at his watch to check the time.
"No, Giles, you should hear this. It's about...Buffy," Xander explained, his eyes drifting to the third man, wondering if he should ask the man to leave.
Giles saw the look and stepped forward. "Oh, pardon my rudeness. This is Lorne DuPont. He will be serving as Buffy's psychiatrist."
Nodding, Xander shook hands with Lorne. "Good, you should hear this, too."
"What's going on, Xander?" Angel butted in.
"Willow...she...she told me..." Xander sighed, hating what he was about to say. "I think I know what pushed Buffy over the edge last night."
"Really?" Lorne said pensively, stepping forward. "It would definitely be helpful to know what made that little cupcake crumble."
Angel scowled at Lorne, but didn't say anything. He'd met the psychiatrist half an hour earlier and he'd already realized the man was rather unconventional. Besides, all that mattered now was finding out what Xander knew.
"Xander?" Angel prodded for a second time.
Taking a deep breath, Xander glanced warily at Angel for a moment before delving into the conversation he'd had earlier that morning. "Willow...she got into an argument with Buffy. Well, I don't actually think it was an argument. She sort of said some stuff to Buffy. Not nice stuff."
"What did she say?" pressed Lorne anxiously. Although he didn't know who this 'Willow' person was, he knew that he would be able to treat his patient much better if he had all the important information.
"She accused Buffy of being the reason Oz is dead," he finally blurted out.
"What?!" Angel shouted, hands balling into fists at his sides.
"Something about how Oz should have been with her, not here with Buffy, and that if he'd moved away with her, he would still be alive. She basically told Buffy it was her fault," Xander continued, uneasily waiting for Angel to blow.
He didn't have to wait long as a string of curses flew from his friend's mouth. They all flinched when one of the chairs was kicked across the room. Eventually, Angel's tirade settled into angry pacing from one end of the room to the other.
"How the hell could she say something like that to Buffy?" Angel snarled to no one in particular.
"I know," agreed Xander sadly. "I never thought Willow was capable of being so uncaring."
"I take it this Willow is close to Buffy?" Lorne interjected, trying to piece everything together.
"You could say that," Xander answered. "She and Buffy have been best friends for at least six years."
"Geez," Lorne grumbled, wincing. He was perfectly aware that a grieving person could act irrationally, but he could imagine what an accusation such as that would do to someone as emotionally fragile as Buffy.
"Willow and I are going to have to have a little talk," Angel snapped, still talking to himself.
Xander put a hand on Angel's arm, forcing him to stand still for a second. "I agree, we'll have to work things out with her, but right now we have to focus on Buffy."
Begrudgingly, Angel nodded, though he would have felt better after yelling at Willow. First priority was Buffy. Willow would be dealt with later. He finally stopped his pacing and looked to Lorne.
"Can you help her?" he asked hopefully.
"Yes, I think so. She's going to need some good old fashioned TLC, along with a little bit of therapy," Lorne explained, glancing at the information Giles had given him. "She's emotionally spent right now. I suspect it was only a matter of time before she broke, but this confrontation with Willow just made it happen sooner."
"It wasn't her fault that Oz died," Angel felt the need to say.
"Yeah, it was a car accident, and Buffy wasn't even with him!" Xander added.
"I have filled Lorne in on the details of Oz's death, as well as Joyce's," came Giles' steady voice.
Lorne thought for several seconds, a crease forming on his brow. "Somewhere in her mind she knows that she's not to blame, but her current emotional state has made her susceptible to what you would think are completely unbelievable suggestions."
"I can't believe Willow would blame her," Angel mumbled, half in disgust and half in shock.
"Angel," Giles started. "Willow is suffering, too. You have to remember that. I am not condoning what she said, but everyone handles grief differently."
"Giles is right," Lorne agreed. "Right now, Willow feels the need to blame someone. I don't know Willow, but my guess is she doesn't really blame Buffy. Once some time has passed, and Buffy is doing better, they should sit down and talk things out."
"I don't think-"
"Angel!" a new voice sounded, interrupting Angel.
"Gunn? What are you doing here?" Angel questioned, looking at one of his and Xander's fellow officers.
"I brought this over," Gunn replied, holding up a stack of papers. "I thought you might want to see it."
"Is that?" Angel asked, only inferring the rest of the question.
"Yeah." Gunn nodded and handed the file to Angel.
As Angel started to skim through the pages, Xander stepped closer and peered over his shoulder. "What is it?"
"It's the final report on Oz's accident," Gunn explained when Angel didn't.
"That was quick," Xander said in surprise, knowing how long these things normally took to get completed.
Gunn shrugged. "Chief put a rush on it, and it was pretty straight forward."
"If you don't mind me asking, what does it say?" Lorne questioned, nodding to the papers in Angel's hands.
"Who are you?" Gunn asked suspiciously.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Lorne DuPont. I'm Buffy's psychiatrist," Lorne introduced himself.
When Gunn hesitated in explaining the results of the investigation, Angel shook his head, closed the file and handed it to Xander. "It's okay. He should know," Angel allowed.
Nodding curtly, Gunn faced Lorne and summarized the findings. "Seventy-one year old female on her way home from babysitting her grandkids. She stated that a dog ran in front of her car and she swerved to avoid it. Her car, a ninety-nine Honda Accord, crossed the midline into opposing traffic. The first car in the other lane managed to get out of the way. Oz was behind that car, and from what we can tell, when he swerved to avoid hitting her, he lost control of the van and hit the telephone poll."
Lorne listened to everything intently, jotting down notes in Buffy's patient file. "Tox screens?" he asked without looking up.
"Negative on the woman. No alcohol, no drugs, and no medical conditions that could have played a role. Oz was clean also. The driver of the other car had a little bit of alcohol in his system, but well under the legal limit," Gunn relayed in typical police fashion.
"So no fault," Xander concluded. He paused for a second, then sighed. "I don't know what's worse, having it be just an accident, or if it would have been a drunk driver or something."
"Unfortunately, the end result is the same," Lorne stated as he finished adding to his notes. "Buffy's brother, and your friend, didn't survive, and now she, as well as all of you, have to deal with that."
"Yes well," Giles began to say, but he abruptly stopped when a loud crash from down the hall reached their ears. An aggravated shout soon followed.
"LET ME OUT OF HERE!"
Before any of the others could react, Angel was sprinting out of the room and toward the continuing agitated yells. Xander knew it was inappropriate, but he let loose a small chuckle anyway. "Sounds like the Buffster's awake."
Angel reached Buffy's room quickly. Walking through the door, he could see a nurse crouched down on the floor cleaning up a spilt pitcher of water. He didn't know whether she'd dropped it or Buffy had thrown it. Either one was possible. As for Buffy, she was pacing around the room, pulling open the drawers of the bedside tables. Her movements were jerky, and her hands were trembling. In that moment, as Angel watched her tense form, he made a promise to himself. He wasn't going to run anymore, he wasn't going to leave her alone. Too long he had stayed away, and it was time for it to stop.
"Buffy, what are you doing?" he asked softly.
"Looking for clothes," she answered distractedly, pausing in her search for only a second to glance at Angel.
"Why?"
"Cuz I wanna go home!" she snapped in a semi-shout as her search once again picked up its pace.
Angel sighed. He knew how much Buffy hated hospitals, and he couldn't blame her, but right now she needed to be here. Walking over to her, he crouched down and gently pulled her hands away from the drawers. She flinched at his touch, but he tried not to let it affect him.
"You need to stay here," Angel answered, unconsciously stroking her hand with his thumb.
"I wanna go home," Buffy repeated just above a whisper.
"Giles says you can go home in a few days. He wants to get you better first," he explained.
"I'm fine," she refuted, making a halfhearted attempt to pull her hand away, realizing only then who exactly she was talking to and who was touching her.
Looking down at Buffy's arm, Angel's fingers traced one of the bandages that rested on her forearm before trailing down to her hand, touching the reddened and bruised knuckles. "This doesn't look fine," he stated, staring down at the injuries.
Buffy snatched her hand away, raising it to eye level. She gaped at the various marks, bruises, and bandages that spotted her entire right arm, then raised her left arm and saw nearly matching injuries. Her eyes closed as she shook her head and winced. Opening them again, she looked at her arms then at Angel.
"I...I don't remember...," she trailed off, frightened.
"Shh," Angel comforted. "You'll be fine. They're just some surface cuts. Giles just wants to keep an eye on you for a few days. He says you haven't been eating or sleeping much and he wants to make sure you do."
"But I wanna go home," she said for a third time.
"I know you do, but..." Angel paused, knowing that if he asked her to stay for him she'd rebel. He opted for a different route. "But the sooner you do what Giles says, the sooner you can go home."
Buffy glanced down at her arms, then back to Angel before her eyes flitted away quickly. She tried to stand, but her knees buckled. Angel caught her before she could fall. He carefully held onto her arms and helped her to stand.
"You should get some more sleep," he told her, leading Buffy to the bed. "I promise when you wake up, you can talk to Giles and find out when he'll let you go home."
Reluctantly, Buffy obeyed and climbed onto the bed, only because of the simple fact that she was exhausted. "I hate hospitals," she groaned, trying to get comfortable on the hard bed with its coarse sheets.
"I know," Angel said, a small smile on his face. He took one of her hands into his, warming it with his touch. "I will stay with you the whole time."
"You don't have to. I'll be fine by myself," Buffy replied distantly, yanking her hand away from his.
"Don't push me away, Buffy," Angel pleaded, despite knowing she had every right to do so.
"No, that's your job," she shot back tiredly, her eyes already closing as she drifted back to sleep.
TBC!!
