A/N: Soooo sorry for the long wait people! Way too many things going on at the moment so updates are coming kind of slow. Apologies! Hope you like this chap though!
Disclaimer: I usually have such fun writing these but sadly I have lost the will to be sarcastic. So I will repeat one of my other disclaimers. Joss is a god and we are but mere mortals.
"Table for six please" Buffy said cheerily.
Outside, it was all smiles and golden hair. But inside, Buffy was trying very hard not to panic. In theory, going out to dinner together had seemed perfect. They would all eat turkey and bond as a family and Dawn would say 'God bless us everyone'. OK, so maybe that was going a teensy bit far. However in reality, a public dinner was looking like a really bad idea. In the car ride on the way over, she had tried to remember why they had never gone out for dinner before and then she remembered all the various crises and demons that had popped up. Maybe fate was trying to tell them something. But Buffy was a fighter and she wasn't going to give up that easily. She was going to prove that she could have a civilized, normal family holiday and that was that.
"This way please madam"
The gracious waiter led them all over to a large round table in the corner. Xander got there first and held out his arms grinning goofily.
"Please sit, my gracious knights"
They all just looked at him eyebrows raised as they sat down. Dawn brushed past as she went to sit down next to Spike. "Wrong century to be funny Xand"
Spike smirked silently. No need to provoke Buffy into violence in public, he thought.
"Can I take your drinks orders?"
"Hey, can I have wine?" Dawn asked eagerly.
Buffy looked at her sister over her menu sternly. " A world of no"
"I'll have a beer and I think my friend Spike here would like a glass of virgin's blood if you have any" Xander said smiling evilly at Spike.
"What…" the waiter said puzzled.
"Bloody Mary!" Buffy blurted out quickly, giving a fake laugh. "He meant a bloody Mary! He's just a little confused, isn't that right Xander?"
Buffy glared at him with such strength that Xander felt slightly scared.
The waiter looked at them both strangely and just shook his head. "Anything else?"
"Just a bottle of sparkling water please" Buffy replied giving the waiter her best we're-not-crazy smile.
She waited until the waiter had gone before turning to Xander. "Do I need to explain how NOT funny that was?"
"Hey, lighten up Buff, I was just trying to break the ice a little bit, you know, make the blood sucking fiend feel at home"
"You better watch your mouth…" Spike began sitting up, but Buffy interrupted.
"Guy's this is a nice restaurant and I am not having our Christmas dinner ruined just because you two feel the need to act like little children" She said sternly, giving both Spike and Xander equally harsh looks.
Tara leaned over to whisper in Willow's ear. "Is she always like this on holidays?"
Willow sighed, "Trust me, this is nothing. You should see her on Thanksgiving"
Just then, a phone bleeped loudly.
Dawn rumbled in her bag guiltily. "Oops, that's just Janice texting me to say Merry Christmas"
"Will you turn that off? It's incredibly rude to have that on when your out" Buffy hissed
Dawn rolled her eyes and switched off, grumbling incoherently.
Buffy exhaled slowly trying to keep her cool. It was OK, she was going to have a nice normal Christmas and nothing was going to spoil that.
"They have blood on the menu! Look's like they made the restaurant Sunnydale friendly," Spike said chuckling.
Buffy snatched the menu so fast that only Spike could actually see it. "What! They can't have blood on the…" she breathed out suddenly, relieved. "Oh thank god, I thought I was gonna have to stake the chef! There's no blood on here!" she said giving Spike back the menu harshly, angry with him for getting her scared like that.
"Too right there is! Look, see? Black pudding. That stuff's basically pig's blood" Spike retorted defensively.
"There's blood in the pudding? Remind me not to have desert" Xander said looking queasy
"It's not a desert pudding its like a traditional dish made in Scotland I think, it has about a quart of pigs blood in it, but there's other stuff to" Willow explained.
"Nice with abit of bacon as well" Spike added, rubbing his stomach.
"Well I've officially lost my appetite" Dawn said, rubbing her stomach for an entirely different reason then Spike, looking like she was going to be sick.
"No! Come on it's just a stupid Scottish dish and Spike's not even going to have it at the table so we can still have turkey" Buffy replied trying desperately
"Well then what the hell am I supposed to eat?" Spike asked looking at Buffy questioningly.
"You can run over to the butcher's shop, I think it's still open," Buffy answered pulling some money out of her purse.
Spike looked at the money in his hand. Well, he thought. There goes my shot at having a nice family dinner with the gang. He sighed and stuffed the money in his pocket before picking up his jacket and walking out, not looking back.
Buffy watched him go before turning round with a bright smile on her face. "So, shall we order?"
Spike looked up at the cool night sky and saw all the stars twinkling back at him. A part of him - and he would never have admitted this to anyone- was secretly wishing that just for one year, he could have the little picture perfect Christmas. Chestnut's roasting on an open fire and all that rot.
He has seen many Christmas's in his time, most of them were spent in back alley's eating a drunkard who had stumbled out of the local tavern on his way home or in lavish hotels after him and Dru had eaten the owner's. What always amazed him though, was that every year he always walked past at least one family dinner. It happened so often he was sure that it was the same family who were following him around but he knew it wasn't really. Every year, he would see a man at the head of a table, carving turkey while his wife and family waited eagerly. They were all happy, all smiling. He tried it once with Dru and the gang but it kind of ruins the affect when the meal is bleeding on the carpet.
He thought back to the night when him and Buffy had finally gotten together and they had spent the night on the snow. In one of the brief interludes when Buffy was trying to catch her breath, he had realized that this was the first Christmas he might actually have a shot and being that guy at the head of the table. He could have Buffy and the nibblet on either side (both staring up at him adoringly of course) the witches, all waiting for him to cut the turkey. Hell, the whelp could even come so long as he kept his mouth shut. But now as he looked at the neon lights of the butcher's he knew he was a fool to believe that he could ever be that lucky. He sighed in a way that was similar to Buffy's and heard a ping as he opened the door.
"Should we have meat gravy or just gravy?" Buffy asked puzzled.
"What kind of question is that? Meat gravy obviously" Xander replied
"Yeah but Mom always used to make turkey with just plain gravy and it always tasted good. Dawn, what do you think?"
"I think we should order the turkey before I die of starvation" Dawn answered, irritated.
"There's no need to be like that, I just want to make sure we got it right that's all" Buffy said defensively
"Yeah well, it's been like an hour and we STILL haven't eaten"
Buffy snapped the menu shut "Tell you what, you order while I go to the bathroom"
"Thank god, does that mean we actually get to eat now?" Anya said relieved.
"Indigestion is just a few words away," Xander answered, rubbing her hand comfortingly.
Buffy walked towards the bathroom, dodging tables until she came to a corridor. She heard a crash coming from the kitchen and stopped.
Probably just a broken plate, she thought, and carried on walking. Another, louder crash came from the kitchen a few steps in front of her. This time, her slayer senses were tingling. She closed her eyes. I am not going to overreact to this, she reasoned. I am just going to go to the bathroom and then I'm going to go back and celebrate Christmas.
She was right next to the kitchen door when she heard a cry and several loud crashes. Buffy paused momentarily. On a scale of one to ten, how bad was it to walk past this?
"Stupid sacred duty" Buffy grumbled opening the swinging door to the kitchen to see a vampire wrestling with the chef.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you to wear an apron to dinner?" She asked, hands on hip, the door swinging shut behind her. "Because now you're going to stain this nice mans outfit"
The vampire let go of the chef growling "Slayer, what do you want?"
"You wanna know what I want?" Buffy asked as she ran forward and pinned the vampire against the wall " I want a nice normal Christmas"
The vampire punched her and she let go, but she retaliated by punching it in the stomach and as it bent over she slammed a silver tray on its back causing it to lie spread out on the floor on its front.
"I want gravy" Buffy pulled it up of its back and threw it against a counter.
"I want roast potatoes" Buffy punched the vampire, and it punched her back, clocking her jaw hard.
"But most of all" Buffy stood up and looked the vampire straight in the eye. "I want turkey" She kicked it so hard that it went straight through the wooden door, shattering it to splinters. The vampire landed on its back and looked down at its chest seeing a piece of wood sticking out. A look shock appeared before it turned to dust.
Suddenly the back door was kicked off its hinges and three more vampires appeared. "Oh good, you brought company" Buffy said tiredly.
All three vamps attacked her and she managed to fight them off, but one grabbed her from behind and threw her through the glass partition that separated the kitchen from the restaurant.
People ran screaming as Buffy landed on a table, and before she could even get up, one of the vamps had jumped through and held her by the throat.
"Spike!" She managed to get out, coughing while trying to claw off the steel like grip of the vampire.
All of a sudden, the vampire's face turned from glee to shock as he turned to dust. Buffy sat up choking clutching her throat as the dust disintegrated.
Her eyes widened as she registered who she was seeing. "Riley?"
Riley stared back at her with a stake in his hand in black army gear. They both stared at each other transfixed until a scream came from the other side of the restaurant.
"Fight now, talk later" Buffy ordered.
Told you I was going to stick to the canon! As you might guess this is the beginning of my version of As you were but things are going to go a little differently this time. Mainly because we are not going to have the horrible ending that we did in the show. Hehe, looking forward to it! But it will come alot quicker if you REVIEW!
