For notes, warnings and disclaimers see chapter 1
Chapter 34: A Father's Betrayal
(Giles's POV)
Joyce called me to tell me what happened and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it... or maybe I do know, after all those feelings don't come as much of a surprise. I know I am disgusted, angry and hurt for Buffy's sake. It's her eighteenth birthday and it's supposed to be special, unfortunately her own father seems to have other priorities.
Even though I've only met the man once, the truth is that I still can't believe that Hank stood Buffy up, not today of all days. Things haven't been great between father and daughter, in fact it's been over a year since they've seen each other but apparently they used to have a sort of tradition in which he took her to an ice show for her birthday each year... or at least that's how Buffy tells it, though I suspect it wasn't as regular an occurrence as she would have liked it to be. I've known Buffy for almost two years now and I do know that that's not how it went last year.
I wonder what would have happened if Buffy had gone with her father for her seventeenth birthday, if she hadn't been here for her birthday party, if we hadn't discovered that Spike and Drusilla were attempting to reassemble the Judge, if she hadn't gone after them with Angel, if she hadn't...
It's one of those questions I'll never be able to answer. If she hadn't been here for her seventeenth birthday would the Judge have brought about the end of the world or would we have been sparred a world of hurt? The thing is that now that's all in the realm of the what ifs, it doesn't really matter. What matters is that if last year was anything to go by, then this is not the first time that Hank has stood his daughter up on her birthday, though if I have anything to say about it, it will most definitely be the last.
The oddest thing is that, while I am rather upset on Buffy's behalf, there is also a part of me that is actually relieved by the fact that they won't be getting together, though I would definitely have preferred it if he hadn't asked her to spend that time with him in the first place. I'm not sure where the certainty comes from, but the truth is that there is a part of me that keeps telling me that as painful as her father's betrayal is for her right now it will actually spare her some heartache in the long run simply because there's no way Hank Summers is ready to understand the changes in his daughter... of course, Buffy is very good at hiding those changes and somehow I don't think he'd be all that observant, not when it comes to something as trivial and unimportant as his own daughter.
The thing is that even though I'm not sure I understand it myself, I do know that there are a lot of things I still know nothing about concerning Buffy's experiences in LA. I know what happened, of course, but I'm not naive enough to believe that I'm aware of everything she went through. There are quite a few things that, while they still remain unmentioned, are painfully obvious... and I'm fairly certain that some of those have to do with the way in which she perceives her own father.
I don't know what happened while she was in LA, not really, at least not that particular aspect of it but I do know something happened. She's never mentioned it and I've been reluctant to push the issue as there always seemed to be other things that were far more urgent but that doesn't mean that I'm unaware of the results. Those are all too obvious.
When I first met her, Buffy used to idolize her father but now there is a sense of anger there, one I'm not really sure I understand and one I'm not sure she is willing to acknowledge not even to herselfbut the truth is that it was enough to make me nervous about the upcoming encounter between them. Of course I knew better than to try and say anything about it. I know she has a temper, I know she is incredibly stressed over what's been happening to her lately and even though the fact that her strength was not an issue this time around did provide me with a measure of comfort in that particular regardthat stress was enough for me to worry about how she would have reacted to her father should he have said or done the wrong thing... something I feared was all but unavoidable under the circumstances.
The point is that while I'm relieved by the knowledge that there won't be a meeting between Buffy and Hank, I am all too aware that this whole fiasco could certainly have been handled better, but it wasn't and now we are left with no choice but to deal with the fallout. Yes, the fact that Hank decided to cancel at the last minute, that he didn't even have the courage to call and tell her himself but rather chose the coward's way out, that he merely sent her a note and some flowers angers me deeply but I'm not troubled by his absence.
Buffy is turning eighteen and that marks the end of Hank's legal obligation to his daughter. I don't know why I had hoped that things between them would go down differently this time around. Maybe it was due to the fact that I had the feeling that this was going to be the last chance he was going to have to try and maintain some sort of connection with his daughter, one that would maybe let Buffy know that she hadn't been totally abandoned but that is clearly not going to happen. Even though I'm not exactly a fan of Hank Summers I had wanted Buffy to be able to hold on to that relationship as she becomes an adult. It wasn't something I wanted for myself, it was something I wanted for her, something I had hoped would provide her a small measure of comfort and a sense of support but it obviously wasn't meant to be... and the truth is that I'm no longer even sure whether Buffy really wanted it to happen in the first place. She is still extremely confused about a number of issues and I fear that this incident is only going to add to her confusion.
The thing is that ever since I can remember Hank's been a giant shadow hanging over Buffy, though I must admit that in a really strange twist it was a shadow that seemed to have lifted somewhat in recent months when she welcomed the idea of Joyce and I getting together. That was a major change, one that caught me totally off guard, one I'm incredibly grateful for, but still Hank is her father... or he was.
For Hank Summers his daughter was nothing more than an obligation, an unwelcomed reminder of his past and his failed marriage, and he has obviously chosen not to have a relationship with her. For him she was a legal responsibility, a burden from which he has now been released and that means that from this day forward I am her only father, not because I have to be but because I want to be. When I married Joyce we adopted Faith but I never took any legal steps to formalize my relation with Buffy, we didn't have to. Yes, in the eyes of the law she will always be Hank Summers's daughter but that doesn't really matter, it doesn't really mean anything.
Her father may have turned his back on her but I don't intend to do so. I know her and I'm proud of her. She is everything I wished she would be... she's more than I ever expected her to be. I remember a couple of years ago when she first walked into my library. Back then I didn't know what to make of her. She was not what I was expecting, she was not what the Council had trained me to deal with and I was completely lost. She forced me to think for myself, to work with her in her own terms and that was probably her greatest achievement, the one that brought us to this point.
Since I met her she's gone from being my slayer to being my daughter and in an oddly fitting way her birthday will signal that transition. She may be disappointed by the fact that Hank was a no-show but as much as that angers me it is also a source of relief.
Of course, I know getting angry at Hank also gives me a neat excuse not to get angry at myself. We are both betraying her, she was counting on him to take her to that ice show... she is still counting on me to do my best to keep her safe.
o-o-o-o
Author's note: sorry about the delay in getting this chapter out, real life got in the way.
