After Giles left, he was even more pleased to find some more of his things in the bedroom. Faith explained that his leg needed proper elevation and support, and it had a good chance of slipping off the couch. And she was damned if she was gonna give up her own bed. They would share the bed, she said, proclaiming that since he needed to be well rested, there would be no repeats of previous performances.
At least until he was healthy. Xander was willing to take what he could get.
Willow and Buffy came over later that day, and said that a city construction crew had showed up and started doing things. When Giles had asked about it, they said they were putting in a wheelchair accessible ramp from the sidewalk to the front door. A memo had been circulated to teachers saying that any students with special needs would be allowed to use the service elevator to travel between floors.
Nobody knew why it was happening, but they were all grateful… and suspicious.
Xander and Faith spent the next three days together. They joked, they watched television and movies, and they read, Faith picking up each of Xander's comics pretty much as soon as he was done with them. Faith managed to make a mildly serviceable dinner on the second day, but they pretty much stuck to take out and delivery – Chinese and pizza.
They also talked. Faith revealed that Willow had told her some of his life at home, and what it had been like for her – she'd had it worse, not that it was a competition. They talked about everything. What they liked, what they didn't, their deepest secrets, their biggest embarrassments, their greatest sexual fantasies. Faith, Xander quickly found, was not hesitant about or embarrassed by sex talk.
On Thursday, Xander had a check up at the hospital. He was deemed healthy enough to return to school, so long as he abstained from any strenuous activity, and he stayed in his wheelchair. The next morning, Faith wheeled her boyfriend to school and at the front door, in front of everyone, planted a scorching kiss on his lips that kept him smiling through the first three periods.
When the school day was over, Xander wheeled himself into the library backwards – the only way he could get there without smacking his leg – and whipped around to find the entire group just sitting around talking.
"What?" he said. "No demons? No bad guys? No nothing?"
Buffy shrugged. "There's absolutely nothing going on. Patrol's been quiet, nothing more than the normal vamps."
So Xander sat there, playing around on his wheelchair and talking to his friends. He quickly learned how to spin around and make very sharp turns at fairly high speeds. Giles, though annoyed, was reluctant to admonish him, and settled instead for polishing his glasses and clucking his tongue a lot. Around about five, they loaded Xander into Oz's newly steam-cleaned van and dropped him off at Faith's apartment.
"You know," he said, as he munched on pizza, "you shouldn't just stay here all day."
"What do you mean?" she asked, as she wiped some tomato sauce from her lip with her sleeve.
"I mean, come hang out with us. School's out at three, there's no reason for you to just hang around here. Hell, I bet Giles wouldn't mind if you hung around the library most days."
"I got TV here," she said. "Why would I wanna leave that for a buncha dusty old books?"
Xander shrugged. "Somebody to talk to," he said. "And I could totally come in at lunch time and we could make out."
"Loser," Faith said, laughing at him. She leaned across the table and kissed him just the same.
"I'm serious, though," he said. "Think about it. The guy's'd love to have you."
"Guys always want me," Faith said.
Xander glared at her. "I mean it," he pleaded. "Please?"
"Maybe," Faith said. Xander dropped it.
That night, when they were going to sleep, Faith leaned over and kissed Xander. "Thanks," she said.
"For what?" he asked.
"Earlier. Thinkin' of me. Askin' me to be a part of the group."
"Why wouldn't I?" he asked. Faith smiled and rested her head against his chest.
"Don't change, huh?" she said.
Xander didn't have anything to say to that, so he wrapped his arm around his girlfriend – who he got to spend each night with – and turned off the light. When he woke, she was still there.
The next week went by smoothly. The Hellmouth was quiet – which freaked everyone out a little – and Xander and Faith continued to get along great. Faith did indeed start showing up after school to hang with the gang. When she showed up on Monday, Xander greeted her with a kiss and pulled her into his lap. He immediately regretted it. His leg was not ready for such things.
Xander's week went well. He caught up on all his missed work – with the help of the wonderful and lovely Willow – and after a Wednesday check up, he even got to hobble around the apartment on crutches for an hour a day.
Things, in fact, were going so well that he had Faith and Buffy sneak back into his parents' house and retrieve the rest of his clothes and a bunch of his other 'cool junk.' They left his old room barren, and he and Faith spent the rest of that day deciding what to toss out and what to keep.
The porn, by unanimous vote, was not thrown out.
That Friday, Angel returned from his trip. He showed up at the library fairly late and, after an exuberant greeting from Buffy, told everyone that the trip had been fine, if a little boring, and that Alan Finch was safe, and in good hands. Then he and Buffy went out on patrol to catch up.
"Wow," Angel said as he and Buffy strolled hand-in-hand through Restfield Cemetery. "A lot happened while I was gone. The box, Xander and his leg, him moving in with Faith…"
"Oh!" Buffy said. "And I didn't even tell you the biggest news! Faith's pregnant with Xander's baby!"
"You're kidding," Angel said.
"I know. Weird, isn't it? Xander's gonna –"
"No, I mean you're actually kidding right?" Angel asked.
"Oh, don't be like that, he's going to be a good father. And she'll… I'm sure she'll be fine as a mother."
"Buffy," Angel said, shaking his head, "Faith isn't pregnant."
"What?" Buffy said. A vampire jumped out from behind a crypt. She quickly stabbed it in the chest with her stake, and turned back to Angel. "What do you mean she's not pregnant? They had a blood test!"
"I don't care if they had three," he said. "Faith's not pregnant."
"And just how do you know that, Mr. I-haven't-been-here-guy?"
"Because," Angel said. "I'd have smelled it if she was."
"Well, well maybe you just missed it. I mean, you weren't specifically trying to tell if –"
"Buffy, trust me," he said. "This is not something in question. Vampires can smell that kind of hormone shift from a hundred feet."
"How do you know? What, did you like make sport of hunting them?"
Angel looked down at his girlfriend, frowning.
"Oh," she said, glumly. That was really bad, and she wished she hadn't asked him that. "Wait! But, if she's not pregnant, then how did the test come back like that?"
"I don't know," Angel said. "In my day we knew a woman was pregnant when she started to get big."
"But, she's missing her period!" Buffy protested, feeling she had trumped his sense of smell.
"And you've never done that?"
Buffy was mortified. "You knew?"
Angel shrugged. "It's blood."
She buried her face in his shoulder, and he wrapped his arm around her. "Wow," she said. "Um. We have to go. We have to tell them."
They made their way over to Xander and Faith's apartment, Buffy realizing that she had mentally assigned ownership to both of them, and not just Faith. She knocked tentatively on the door and was surprised when Xander opened it.
"Buffy!" he said. "Look what I can do!"
Xander hopped on one leg in a short circle, balancing one crutch in his hand.
"How long did you practice that?" she asked.
"Only the last hour or so," he said, before sitting carefully back down in his wheelchair with a grin.
"Yeah," Faith said as she came out from the bedroom. "And amazingly, we haven't got complaints from the neighbor downstairs. Hey, B. Fang. What's up?"
Buffy glanced up at Angel. "We need to talk," she said.
"Sure," Faith said. "Come on in."
"Um…" Angel said.
"Both of you," Faith clarified.
Angel nodded his thanks and entered the apartment behind Buffy, closing the door behind himself. Buffy turned to him. "You're sure?" she asked
Angel took a short whiff of the air. "Yeah," he said. "Positive."
"What's up?" Faith asked, sitting on the arm of Xander's chair. He patted her leg and she smiled at him.
"Okay," Buffy said. She began pacing. "It's like this. I was telling Angel about everything that happened while he was gone. The box. The fight. The Xander getting almost killed. And I mentioned the fact that you were pregnant."
"Yeah," Faith said.
"And he said… well, there's these hormones, you see, and Angel said that… well, what he said was –"
"You're not pregnant, Faith," Angel said.
Faith's smile vanished, as did Xander's. "That's not funny," she said.
Angel shook his head. "It's not supposed to be," he said. "But I am being honest. I could smell the change if you were. But you're not."
"But the blood tests –" Xander started.
"Were wrong," Angel said. "I'm sorry."
"No," Faith said, softly. "Um… it's good that you told us… I gotta… I'll be…" she stood up and went into the bedroom, shutting the door behind her.
Buffy looked at Xander, and he just looked lost. The blood had drained from his face, and he looked like he could cry. Buffy encircled him in a hug, and Xander held on to her for dear life, tears flowing.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't know you were… I didn't realize it was that important to you. I didn't realize you had… I'm sorry."
"I didn't realize either, 'til just now," he said. Xander sniffled and wiped his eyes as Buffy released him.
"Well," Buffy said, "we should go. You guys probably have things to talk about."
"Yeah," Xander said, looking at the bedroom door. As they walked out, Xander called out for Angel.
"Yeah?" the vampire asked, sticking his head back in.
"Thank you," Xander said.
Angel nodded, and shut the door, and Buffy wrapped her arms around him.
"That sucked," she said. Angel nodded and held her. Buffy knew there was nothing he could really say, other than clichéd agreement. But deep in her mind, something else was seeding. Buffy knew that, as long as she was with Angel, she'd never feel the emotion of losing a child, which was basically what had happened to Faith and Xander. But she'd also never feel the joy of having one, not by Angel. She suddenly wasn't sure if the one was worth the other.
Xander rolled over to the bedroom door and knocked on it. He didn't hear anything, so he opened the door. Faith was lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. Tears were streaming from her eyes, but she wasn't acknowledging them.
Xander rolled into the room and shut the door behind him. He locked his wheels and managed to get himself out of the chair and onto the bed. He lay down next to Faith and stared up at the ceiling, crying right alongside her. After a few minutes, Faith slid over to him and buried her head in his chest, staining his shirt with her tears.
Xander stroked her hair and back as soothingly as he could. He needed to be strong for her.
"It sucks," he said. Faith rolled away so she was leaning on his arm, looking up at him. "I didn't even realize," he said. "I didn't know how important it was until that moment."
"Are you gonna leave me now?" she asked.
Xander turned his head sharply. "How can you ask me that? How can that even cross your mind?"
Faith shrugged. "It's just… every reason this whole thing started just turned out to be fake."
"That doesn't make what we feel any less real," Xander said. He kissed Faith softly, and she smiled at him through her sadness.
"We weren't ready anyway," she said. "Not really."
"Nah," he said. "We're still just kids ourselves, really."
Faith nodded, her head rolling awkwardly about his arm as she did so.
"But," he said, looking down into her eyes.
"But?"
"But, that doesn't mean I wasn't looking forward to having a baby with you."
"Me, too," Faith said. "It was… I got used to it. It was nice."
"It was," Xander said. "Something to look forward to."
They lay there together, not moving, for a few minutes before Xander spoke again.
"Faith," he said.
"Yeah, baby?"
Xander smiled at the pet name. "Don't freak out on me, okay?"
"About what?" she asked.
Xander pulled her as close to him as he possibly could. "I'm in love with you."
"Yeah?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said. Faith rested her head against his chest.
"I can deal with that," she said. They lay in silence, and after a few minutes Xander reached over and turned the light off.
"Xander," she whispered.
"Yeah?"
"I think I'm in love with you, too."
Xander smiled in the dark, and kissed his girlfriend. It was gonna be okay.
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End Chapter 17