Title: Helping you
Disclaimer: Nope, these characters still aren't mine.
Note: This is part seven of the 'Losing you' series. It takes place two months after 'Forgiving you.' The sixth part of the series.
Helping youXander's appartment, Friday, 6.00 PM
Xander Harris had just opened the door of his appartment, when he heard the phone ring. Cursing, he dropped his groceries bags to run to the phone, but he was to late. He had just picked up his bags when the phone rang again. This time he did get it in time.
"Hi there, this is Xander."
"Hi Xander."
It was Buffy and her voice sounded bittersweet, to sweet. He just knew she wanted something from him.
"What do you want from me, Buff?"
On the other side of the line Buffy frowned, she didn't expect him to know her that well.
"What makes you think I want something from you?"
Xander gave his best Buffy imitation.
"Hi Xander."
He imitated her tone perfectly, and she had to admit that it sounded a bit to sweet. She would have to work on that the next time she wanted a favor from him.
"Ok, you got me, are you happy? I need your help."
Even though she couldn't see him, Xander nodded triumphantly.
"I'm always happy Buff, especially when you tell me I get to have you. What do you want me to do?"
She was a bit distracted by the way he was flirting with her, he did that a lot lately. And somehow it didn't seem to bother her, not to mention the fact that she had been flirting with him too. Big time. But she couldn't dwell on that now.
"You've seen my bedroom right?"
She realised what she had just said and she could almost see him smile. His answer was to be expected.
"I've seen your bedroom Buff, but if you want I'll come over right now and look at it again. With you of course."
She smiled.
"Very funny Harris, but that's not what I mean. I think my bedroom is a bit to girly, like I'm still stuck in my teens. So, I wanna give it a more sophisticated look. And I was wondering if you could help me pick out some new stuff tomorrow. Your appartment doesn't look that crappy, I figured you could help me."
It was true that Xander had a good eye for decorating, which made the fact that he had absolutly no clue how to dress himself even more strange.
"I might be willing to help you. If I get absolute power in the amount of time we're going shopping tomorrow. Also, I don't want you to question everything you want to buy. If I tell you to buy it, you buy it."
She thought about it for a minute.
"Done. See you tomorrow."
"Ok, bye Buff."
"Bye."
She hung up, odly happy about the fact that she was going to spend the day with Xander.
Buffy's House, Saturday, 10.00 AMThe next morning Dawn walked by her sister's room when she noticed a huge pile of clothes thrown on the bed. Looking into Buffy's room, she saw that her sister was standing in front of her closet. Debating what she should wear.
"What the hell are you doing?"
Startled, Buffy turned around.
"Nothing, I just don't know what to wear."
Dawn looked at her a bit sceptical.
"What's the big deal. You're going furniture shopping with Xander, just throw on some jeans and a shirt."
Shaking her head, she walked towards her own room. Until it suddenly hit her why her sister wanted to look as good as possible. Smiling, she did a little happy dance.
"Way to go, Xander...."
Meanwhile, Buffy decided that she was being ridiculous. Her sister was right, she was just going shopping with Xander. He had seen her thousands of times, and since when did she care how she looked in front of him? Taking out a pair of jeans and a simple shirt she quickly got dressed. Not thinking to much about the fact that she picked out the tightest jeans she possesed and a shirt she knew looked stunning on her
Half an hour later, Xander pulled up in front of Buffy's house. He noticed Dawn sitting outside on the frontporch.
"Hey Dawnie."
"Hey Xander."
She was looking at him a bit funny and he wondered if he had put on his shirt backwards.
"Is something wrong?"
She gave him a big, bright smile.
"Nope, everything is fine. Perfect I would say."
"Good."
He walked into the house, still a bit confused about her behavior while Dawn followed him inside. Seeing Buffy, he gave her a smile.
"Hey Buff, you look good today."
Buffy looked at her clothes.
"Oh, these old things..."
Behind them Dawn rolled her eyes, while Xander waved his car keys in front of Buffy's face.
"Ready to go?"
"Sure."
Dawn opened the door for them.
"Bye guys, have a good time. A really, really good time."
She waved at them enthusiasticly, and again Xander got a weird vibe from her.
"Uh, thanks, bye."
Dawn closed the door, grinning from ear to ear.
"Those two are going to be so cute together...."
The mall, 1.30 AMXander couldn't remember the last time he was this bored.
"Buffy, remember the rules I told you about yesterday? Could you just pick out a colour... That way we can paint your room this century!"
She looked at him, her hands on her hips.
"It's not that easy. The colour has to be perfect. It has to match with all the furniture in my room and it has to say 'welcome in Buffy's new, sophisticated room.' That is a lot of pressure to put on a colour."
He felt like banging his head into a wall.
"For crying out loud, just pick one. It's been an hour, we've been looking at paint for an hour!"
Buffy turned to the paint again.
"I will not be rushed."
"Will you at least be persuated to make you choice a bit faster?"
She didn't seem to hear him, looking thoughtful at the items in front of her.
"Yellow says happy, but I don't think it says sophisticated. Maybe I should go with purple, but I'm afraid that will give people a spontaneous head-ache. I've always liked red, but not enough to look at it that much. Black is to black and white says 'I have no imagniation,' but on the other hand green says..."
Xander interrupted.
"Shoot me now, does it say shoot me now?"
"I get the feeling you're not having a good time here."
Xander raised his eyebrows.
"You think? What the hell is wrong with normal colours, like grey or brown, or...whatever. Just pick one."
"Well, I do like brown, and I saw a colour over there that seemed perfect. But I'm afraid it will turn out to dark, and I don't want people to think I'm a dark person."
"First of all, I could always make the colour lighter for you. You just add some white into the mix. Second of all, who are these people you keep refering to? Does the highschool cheerleaderteam practice in your bedroom or something?"
By now she gave him a look.
"If they did you would be in my bedroom all the time."
He winked at her.
"I don't need a cheerleaderteam to be in your bedroom all the time, Buff. Trust me."
She quickly changed the subject.
"I think I'll go with the brown, if you promise you can make it somewhat lighter."
He was ready to promise her the world.
"I'll do anything, but could we please go now?"
"Yes, we can go now, unless you think..."
He grabbed her by the arm.
"No, no, we're not going to think anything. Get the paint you want and move that pretty butt of yours over to the checkout counter."
It was her turn to wink at him.
"Pretty, huh?"
He just grinned while he followed her.
The mall, 2.30 AMAn hour later Xander had finally persuaded Buffy to get something to eat. So they were drinking coffee now and eating a sandwich. Xander was just happy to sit and eat. He had also ordered his best friend to not talk about paint, bookshelfs or new beds for a least half an hour. Giving him a break, Buffy reluctantly obeyed.
The only problem was that now she had time to think about the more serious matters of life. She decided to bother Xander with it anyway. After all, he was the one who banned her favorite topic to talk about.
"Xander, can I ask you a question?"
He looked up from his sandwich.
"Shoot."
She took a deap breath.
"When did you know that you loved Anya?"
He had expected a lot, but defenitely not that question. Looking at her, he saw that the answer was important to her.
"Why the sudden interest in my past relationship with Ahn?"
She sighed.
"It's just...I feel like...You and Willow both know what it's like to love. And I just wanna know how you guys knew. How do you know if you're in love?"
By now he dropped his sandwich, the food forgotten.
"Me and Willow are not in love, why would you think that?"
She laughed.
"I never said you were, I said you both know what it's like to love. You with Anya and Willow with Tara."
He nodded.
"Oh, ok. But I still don't get your question. I mean...you've loved Buffy. Angel, Riley... I know you loved them."
She shook her head.
"I just don't know. Yeah, I loved them both. And Angel, he meant everything to me. Still does in some small part of me. But I'm not sure if it was the love you guys felt. You and Anya were ready to spent your life together. And Willow, I just know she never wants to leave Tara's side. You guys felt adult love, I don't really know if I had that with Angel."
He took her hand in his.
"I can't speak for Willow, but I can tell you that I'm not the one to answer this question. Loving Anya was easy for me, after a while you kinda had to. And she was so important to me, but in a way she was what Angel was to you. My first real love. I don't think I was ready for the kinda love you're talking about. Otherwise I would have married her, but I didn't because I couldn't."
"Yeah, I guess."
Sqeezing her hand, he forced her to look at him again.
"Are you afraid you can never really love someone? Because of the slayer thing and your bad trackrecord with relationships?"
She just nodded and he went on.
"Don't be, Buff. First of all, none of us decide to fall in love. Look at Willow, she never planned to love Tara like she did, but it still happened. And I just believe that it will happen to you too. Because you are great at loving people, you've loved me and Will for the past seven years. And except for a small bump in the road I never had any complaints. Don't start questioning whether you'll fall in love again or not, because I won't happen in a moment. But someday you'll just know, you'll just know that you're in love and that it's for real this time."
She just looked at the guy in front of her.
"How do you stay this positive?"
He smiled.
"I have a lot of great people in my life who I believe in. Including you, Buff. You guys keep me positive."
She got up from her chair.
"Thanks Xand, for always knowing how to cheer me up. So, on a more important note, are you ready to start shopping again?"
"No, not really, but I don't think I have a lot of choices here."
She grinned.
"Nope, none."
He got up, not all to happy about it.
"Ok, let's get this show on the road."
Buffy's house, 6.30 PMSeveral hours later Xander pulled up in front of Buffy's house again.
"Buff, I don't care how sweet you ask next time, I'm not going shopping with you for a least a year."
She pouted.
"Oh, c'mon. We had fun."
"Fun? We looked at bookshelfs for two hours, they all looked the same to me, and I'm a carpenter. If I can't tell the difference, how the hell can you? After that, we looked at beds for the same amount of time, until you decided that there was nothing wrong with your bed in the first place!"
She crossed her arms.
"Well, there isn't."
He sighed.
"Buff, I love you, I really do. But if you do this to me again, I might kill you."
She still wasn't convinced.
"I still had fun. I like having you around me."
The implications of what she said were clear to both of them, but neither was ready to face it yet. Buffy decided she had to get out of the car, but he still followed her to the door.
"Do you mind if I skip dinner with you guys? I'm kinda exhausted from all this shopping, I really want to go home and just do nothing tonight."
She was actually relieved that he wouldn't stay. Some time apart would give them both a chance to think about the way their relationship was changing. Somehow the flirting had stopped being innocent and neither knew how to handle it.
"Yeah, that's fine. I had a nice time today, even if you hated it."
"I didn't hate it, I just didn't like it either."
She laughed.
"I got the message by now, Harris. You think I'm a terrible shopper."
"Good, for a while there I was beginning to think you wouldn't get all my subtle messages."
He reached down to hug her. Something he most always did these days when he said goodbye to her.
"Gotta go Buff, I'll see you tomorrow so we can start painting that sophisticated room of yours."
She let go of him.
"Deal. See you tomorrow."
He walked to his car when he heard her voice.
"Xander, thanks for the talk."
He looked directly into her eyes.
"I meant it, it will happen. You just have to believe it will."
She watched him ride away. Whispering to herself.
"Someday you'll just know you're in love. I'm beginning to believe, Xander..."
tbc...