IV.

Xander watched carefully as a gigantic SUV heaved out of his blind spot and began to pass them. He'd forgotten how much he hated driving the freeways, especially with some one. He would want to look at her but he had to stay focused on the road. He realized that she had been quiet for too long, and risked a glance at her. He looked quickly at the road, at all his mirrors, trying to build a picture of the space around him, and then risked a longer look at Dawn.

"Hey, what's wrong?" She was expressionlessly looking at the check, something akin to Willow's famous Resolve Face, but more empty. "Not enough for snow cones at the park? It's okay, I have a little put away for the week. I'd forgotten that check was even in there."

"Xander," her voice was almost eerily calm, "how long were you a manager at that company?"

"Manager? Dawnie, we'd talked about me moving up, but nothing ever happened. I got hurt, then, later, there wasn't any company to go back to. What's wrong, you're scaring me."

She read, quietly.

"It says, 'Mr. Harris, as one of three claimants for the distribution of the employee fund, you are entitled to a lump sum payment as detailed below. We have taken the liberty of enclosing, in addition, your cash disbursal from Sunnydale Ltd. Life, Insurers, for the injury you suffered resulting in your vision impairment, plus all interest accrued on these balances while we awaited your claim of these funds, detail in section 3 below. In addition to this lump sum payment, your disability payments for the time prior to July of this year have been added, along with reimbursement of your medical expenses minus deductibles… see section 4…' and on and on. There's four pages of this stuff, then the last page is a check."

"Wow. I knew I had coverage and everything, I just figured that getting out alive was good enough, and Anya had always…" He stopped a moment, then squared his shoulders and continued, "she had always done that stuff, and I just left it when we split up. After she died, I didn't want to go into it. So, you're telling me we can buy you some new clothes at the mall, stuff like that?"

He grinned, the first big Xander Harris special grin she's seen in a long time, longer than she'd been away. "Maybe dinner somewhere nice, this Italian place I know makes great chicken. You deserve something nice."

She slowly shook her head, and then realized he could not see the gesture.

"Xander, you can buy anything you want at that restaurant tonight. And tomorrow night. And all weekend. Then Monday you can probably cut out the middle man and just buy the restaurant."

"Wha? With the I say again 'wha?'" He pulled over to the side of the road, stopped, put on the brake, and turned to her.

"I'm sorry, that wasn't very clear. WHA?" He was pale, and his hands showed white scars where they gripped the wheel.

She didn't trust herself to speak. She just held up the last page, showing him the check.

"Dawn."

"Yes, Xander?"

"I can't take this money. What would I do with it?"

"Anything you want. Buy whatever you need, whatever you want…"

"I have everything I need."

"Just remember, I loved you before you were rich." It was a joke, and he grinned at her grin. Still, as soon as the words left her mouth, they sounded strange. Better not talk like that, might give the wrong impression.

V.

They drove in silence to his apartment. Then they promptly drove back out, depositing his check in the bank's night box. He said it made him nervous to carry it. They drove back the apartment. Then back out again, to get dinner at the nice and rather cheap Italian place he knew that had great chicken.

It was a subdued evening. If only his old friends could see him. Xander, the Quiet Man. Still, he was comforted by having Dawn there, and she was unsure of what to say, so she filled the gaps with idle chitchat about school, about her classes, and the Nice Boys Who Had Not Worked Out. Xander made the right 'oohs' and 'ahhs' and 'mmm-hmmms' but she could tell he was a million miles away. He let her drive home, which she still enjoyed as something of a novelty.

When they got back to the apartment, Dawn did not unbuckle her seatbelt. She sat, facing straight ahead, and said quietly, "Xander?"

He paused, already opening his door. "Yeah?"

"I have to go to the store. I never did hear from the airline about my bag."

"Oh, I totally forgot. Look, I can loan you a toothbrush, and I'm sure I have something from the oversized manly collection for you to sleep in. Tomorrow we can get everything else sorted out. Is that okay?" He started to climb out, assuming assent.

"Xander?" Her voice had a catch in it that brought him back to his seat in a hurry.

"Dawnie, what's wrong?" He searched her profile, wishing she'd face him. One surprising effect of his reduced depth perception was that profiles were very dramatic and thus hard to read.

"I need some things from the store that can't wait." She turned suddenly and he saw plainly how tough this was for her. "You know… girl… things…"

He barely caught himself from laughing. Poor Dawnie, always a little girl at the worst moments… he knew how embarrassed she was to talk about this, like this, in front of him.

"Dawn, who is my best friend ever, present company excepted of course?"

"Willow? Willow and Buffy."

"Mmm hmmm. And, I lived in a house with you, and Buffy, and Willow, and a dozen odd Slayers in Training, for months. I am distressingly familiar with 'girl things.'" He tried to sound reassuring. Instead she began to quiver her lip in a way that alarmed him.

"It's just, I don't have anything with me, and I expected to have my bag… and I spent all my money on…" She caught herself, and continued, "well I don't have any money left tonight and I'd prefer we do not keep talking about this so I do not have to move away to a temple in Tibet where no one speaks. Okay?"

"There's a pharmacy on Baker, we passed it about three blocks back. You know where?" She nodded. He reached into his billfold. "Here, this was for Disney, we can make it up out of that insane mad money check tomorrow. Get anything you need. I'm going up with the spare key. You use my keys and let yourself in when you get back. Okay?"

She took the bills without looking at them and sniffled a bit, facing ahead again. "I'm so sorry. Maybe I should have gone to London, instead of coming here and getting all drippy."

"Hey, hey!" he took her chin in his hand and turned her again to face him. "It's been a long and very strange evening. I obviously have a lot of thinking to do. I can't imagine doing it without you here. Go get whatever you need, and come home, okay?"

"Okay."

"See you." Without really thinking about it, he leaned forward and gave her a hug. She held back for a moment, and then crushed him with a hug that would have made her Slayer-strong sister proud.

"You're such a good guy, Xan. I didn't mean what I said- I'm glad I came."

"And with the breathing…" he muttered.

"Oh Goddess, sorry!" She let go, blushing. He noticed she looked cute when she blushed, because it went to where her collarbones peeked out of her top. And now he was staring at her chest, so feeling like a dirty old man, he blushed too.

"See you upstairs," he said with feigned casualness and hightailed it to his apartment. She got control of herself a bit and headed for the pharmacy.

When she got back, she found him draped across the couch, surrounded by bills and bank statements and some kind of blueprints. He was snoring softly and his eye patch was a little askew. She knew how much anyone seeing his ruined eye bothered him, so she ever so gently slid the patch back in place. Satisfied, she threw an afghan over him and went to his bedroom.

His bed had clean sheets and was turned down, with a bunch of daisies in a purple ribbon on the pillow with a note that said, "Welcome Home, Graduate!" on it. The "Graduate" had an asterisk marked in, and at the bottom he had written, "Well, Earned her Diploma then Skipped Telling Anyone till it was TOO LATE FOR PRESENTS Person!" Inside the card were two passes to Disneyland and a note: "D- for a magical vacation -X."

She took care of this and that in the small bathroom, then put on a large white t-shirt that had been laid out on the bed. As she fell asleep, she realized that it smelled like him. It was a comforting smell.

VI.

October 9.

Xander woke to the smell of coffee and the sound of quiet conversation coming from his bathroom. That was unusual, on both counts. Also, he was fully dressed and had managed to get bed hair and sweaty neck from sleeping on his couch.

"Kasey, look… Kasey? …That's not fair."

He recognized Dawn's voice, but she was obviously trying not to be heard. He checked his eye patch, closed his eye and tried unsuccessfully not to listen.

"I've said I'm sorry. No, I don't think you are listening to me. No. No, you've never really…" She paused for a long while, and then continued more evenly, "Can we just not do this now? Fine. No. Fine. I'm hanging up now." She was crying, or near it. "No. No. I'm hanging up now. I'm hanging… yeah. Good bye."

When the bathroom door opened Xander lay, feigning sleep.

"I'm sorry. I know you're up. I'm…." She gestured vaguely back over her shoulder with the phone towards the bathroom. "I'm sorry," she repeated. She flopped on the end of the couch, sliding under his feet so they lay in her lap as he stretched the kinks out of his neck.

"Anything you want to talk about, Dawnmeister?" He pulled his feet off her lap and sat up, rolling his shoulders with cracks and pops as he tried to smooth his hair down.

"No. Yes." She smiled and shot him a quick look. "Yes, but not now?"

"Ah, that place. I too have resided in Yesbutnotnowville. I think it's near Whoville, but I may be mistaken." He sniffed. "And elves snuck in today and made coffee."

She rose and got him a cup as he started absentmindedly tidying up the paper storm surrounding the couch and coffee table.

"Thanks." He took a sip. Black, sweet. Perfect. For some reason he remembered an old Taster's Choice commercial with some dashing coffee drinking guy that was all sophisticated and flirting. He wished he could say something clever from that, but it was too early even for his encyclopedic memory of pop culture to dredge that one up. She'd probably never seen it anyway.

"So, the House of the Mouse today?"

She still seemed a little melancholy.

"Well," she said, "I already called the airline. Still no baggage, luggage or otherage. I can't exactly wear this out, can I?" She gave the hem of her nightshirt a little pop and he realized with a start that she was wearing his old white t-shirt.

He's seen her wear less, over the years, even a bikini that had been rather impressive one summer. Still, he'd been living pretty much alone for over a year, and was not prepared for the miles and miles of thigh that flashed his way when she did that. He looked around, anywhere but at her legs.

"Oh, hey. We can find something for you to wear. Go hit some stores. Don't worry about money, I'll take care of you." He reached out to put his hand comfortingly on her knee, but thought the better of it. This left his hand wavering around awkwardly in front of her for a long moment while his brain shifted gears.

She stared at his hand like it was a cobra in her cornflakes. She opened her mouth but seemed powerless to speak as her eyes tracked his hand around, back and forth. Finally he pulled his hand back and she forced herself to speak.

"So, um. Uh, you actually decided to use some of that money? From yesterday? Good for you, you deserve it."

"'That money…?' Oh. Oh! THAT money. Actually I'd forgotten." He laughed softly. "Not used to having it there. I guess I'm just used to promising to take care of you… Dawn?"

She'd clouded over like a seaside town with a sudden wind change.

"I'm not a little girl any more, Xander Harris. I'm not little Dawnie who needs a supernatural army living in her living room to protect her, thank you for noticing. I haven't been that girl for years, and I wish you would stop treating me like I was." She huffed up off the couch and went into the bedroom before he could say anything.

"The hell…?" he wondered out loud.