Buffy woke up to the sound of the vacuum the next morning.
Frowning to herself and grumbling sleepily, she rolled over to glace at her alarm clock, giving a full-bodied jerk when she registered the time - 11:30! Swallowing hard, she tried to calm her suddenly racing heart, forced herself to relax beneath the sheets as all the anxiety and panic of the last few days came rushing back to her in a flood before slowly receding again.
Her mom was ok.
She and Dawn were ok.
She didn't have anywhere to be, and hey - 11:30 wasn't after noon, ergo still morning.
Yawning widely, she dragged herself sluggishly out of bed and ran her hands through greasy, tangled hair, frowning as she pulled at the snarls. First things first then; a shower and a good blow-dry. Pulling her towel from the hook at the back of her closet, she crossed the bedroom to collect her clothes but froze with her hand on a dresser drawer when she realized that she was subconsciously but actively reaching out with her Slayer senses, searching for Spike's signature inside the house.
She couldn't find it.
Tamping down the disappointment and swell of nervousness that swooped in her belly, forcing herself to push away the wondering of where he might be, she headed out to the landing just in time for a pause in the roar of the vacuum cleaner.
"I'm gonna shower really quick Dawn!" she called.
"K!"
Buffy smiled a little, shook her head when she didn't get any further reply, just the sound of the vacuum cleaner starting up again - on the other side of the house this time. Her little sister wasn't one for cleaning, ever, so when she'd made her comment the night before about fixing up the house, Buffy had assumed it was just exhaustion talking. Color her surprised then that the teen had meant it, even gotten up early - well, fairly early - to get started.
She hoped it would last.
Showering quickly though she desperately wanted to savor the hot water, Buffy toweled off and took a good deal of care fixing up her hair, drying it thoroughly and combing it until it was as soft as silk and shone like honey. She'd taken her sister's advice, belatedly of course but better late than never, and slipped into the lacy white skirt and emerald blouse she'd offered up as the third date-night option. She added a touch of mascara too, ignoring the fact that she was far too dressed up for a day of work around the house and not caring in the least that she knew she was doing it for one reason and one reason only.
Skipping down to the kitchen, she felt her spirits lift a little as she mentally mapped out her day, made plans to corral her wayward vampire so that she could pin him down long enough to tell him exactly what she needed to tell him. That wasn't to say that she wasn't anxious about it, wasn't a little fearful - that she wouldn't be able to find him, that she'd choke even if she did, that he wouldn't believe her after she'd denied her own feelings and kicked his into the mud for so long…
But she'd convince him.
She had to.
He deserved that much.
Shoot, maybe they both did.
Grabbing an apple out of the fruit bowl, she took a huge bite and chewed ferociously, leaning against the counter as she consumed her breakfast, all the while chasing her thoughts around in circles like a puppy after its tail until her sister clambered in from the dining room lugging a mop and bucket behind her.
"Don't think so hard," she chided, moving to the far corner of the kitchen. "Looks like it hurts."
Buffy rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue but her sister just grinned, her good mood unaffected by the teasing as she began to swish her mop back and forth across the floor.
"Dawn, you know mom probably won't be able to come home until at least tomorrow, right?" Buffy asked carefully, not wanting to upset the younger girl.
"I know," she replied with a shrug, "But I want the house to be nice and…" Dawn paused for a minute, frowning to herself before resuming her mopping. "I know she's ok…" she said slowly, "But I need to be moving, you know?"
Buffy smiled. "Yeah. I know," she replied, taking another bite of her apple. "But she is gonna be ok. We're gonna be ok."
"You mean you and Spike?" Dawn asked, going from melancholy to impish in the blink of an eye, tossing Buffy a smarty-pants smirk over her shoulder.
"Shut up," Buffy huffed, but she couldn't stop the beginnings of a smile.
It didn't last long.
"We've got a Scoobie incoming by the way," Dawn remarked far too causally, suddenly seeming to find her bucket of dirty mop water rather fascinating. "Xander called while you were in the shower. He wanted to know why we haven't been answering the phone."
Buffy grimaced, uncertain of how she felt about her friends at the moment. She was always there when they needed her, when the world needed her, but it had been what? Three, four days? It sure felt like it - longer even. She'd needed support - her Watcher, her friends - and while she knew that they all had their own lives and certainly weren't at her beck and call the way her destiny forced her to be, she couldn't believe that they hadn't come to check on her by now.
"Did you tell them about mom?" she asked, because she needed to be prepared to deal with what was about to come through her front door.
"Yeah," Dawn replied, obviously unsure if she'd done the right thing. "I mean, I didn't know what else…"
"No, it's all right Dawnie," Buffy reassured her, tossing her apple core into the trash and rinsing her hands at the sink. "I don't care that they know, I just…" Buffy sighed. "It would have been nice if they'd known sooner, I guess."
"Yeah," Dawn murmured. "I mean, I know Giles isn't like… our dad or anything, but…" Dawn huffed, pushed her hair back from her face and wrung out her mop. "Anyway. Xander's got a big mouth, so I'm guessing we've got maybe ten minutes left before they're all here."
"Goodie," Buffy muttered flatly.
"What are we gonna tell them?" Dawn asked, lifting the mop bucket to dump the dirt water down the kitchen drain.
"The truth," Buffy replied, sitting down at the island and folding her arms over her chest. "Mom had an aneurism but we got her to the hospital in time. She had another surgery and she's gonna be ok now that they removed the rest of the tumor. She'll probably be able to come home tomorrow, maybe the next day."
"What do we tell them about Spike?"
Buffy sighed, dropped her head down onto the countertop with a thunk. "Nothing," she mumbled.
"Buffy…"
"Not… because of that," she defended, lifting her head so that Dawn could see the sincerity on her face. "I told you last night. I… I do love him."
A minute of silence passed while her words sunk in, settled in the air and beneath her skin.
"Still hard to say huh?" the teenager asked quietly, and Buffy scoffed a half-hearted chuckle.
"Yeah," she sighed. "Guess I just need to practice, right?"
"Might be a good idea."
"I might not be planning to come right out and tell them but I won't hide it Dawn," she promised. "This is my life and I should get to choose who I love and who I don't. And Spike deserves that. I won't… I won't hurt him by making him my dirty little secret."
"Good," Dawn said firmly. "Because he's a good guy Buffy. Or… can be, anyway."
"I know," she answered back. "If there wasn't any good in him at all he never would've made that first deal to stop Acathala. Wouldn't…"
The doorbell interrupted.
"Wow," Dawn said flatly, glancing at the clock above the stove. "They made good time."
"Be nice," Buffy warned as she got up from the island, though she wasn't feeling particularly nice herself.
"Fine," Dawn grumbled, shoving the mop bucket roughly into its place in the broom closet. "But if Xander starts being a jerk, I get to be a jerk back."
"Deal," Buffy assented.
The next ten minutes was a noisy, hectic explosion as Xander, Willow, and Giles all burst in to the front hallway, followed by Anya who came along at a more sedate pace. They bustled the two Summers girls back into the living room, got them forcibly settled onto the sofa while a kettle of tea was steeped and hot cups pressed into their hands. Dawn frowned and brushed them all off, put her cup on the coffee table and moved to the arm chair so that they couldn't coddle her, but Buffy was somehow a little more forbearing, accepting the hugs and the arm that Xander slung around her shoulder, the tea and the concerned looks. It tried her patience, but finally everyone seemed to settle and the babble died down, and she was actually able to discern one question from the other again.
"Buffy what happened?" Willow asked, her pale face pinched.
"Yeah Buffster," Xander said, frowning when Buffy slipped from beneath his arm. "Dawnie said your mom had a heart attack?"
"An aneurism," she corrected, a little bit hurt that he'd gotten it wrong. "In her brain. We got lucky…"
Taking a shaky breath, Buffy wrung her hands together, surprised when Willow took them in her own and surprised that she was surprised. Apparently she was more upset with her friends than she'd thought.
"Anyway," she huffed, moving on as she pulled her fingers away. "I found her on the couch, called the ambulance. We got her to the hospital in time - the doctors stabilized her and then two nights ago the specialist took out the rest of the tumor."
"So she's going to be ok?" Willow asked, shifting anxiously in her seat and watching Buffy's hands with confusion, like she didn't understand why her friend had pulled away.
"Yes," she stated firmly, for herself and Dawn as much as the others, but they all sagged with visible relief just the same. "They took the rest of the tumor out and said that she's gonna make a full recovery. We went to the hospital yesterday and she already seems better, so…"
"But Buffy, I don't understand," Giles said gently, watching her with great intensity. "Why didn't you call? Any of us would have come, of course."
Buffy felt her body go cold and tight and felt her throat close up as the light, fuzzy feelings of frustration and irritation suddenly came into sharp focus, bubbling up into hot anger.
"I did," she said flatly, carefully. "I called from the hospital. I needed somebody to pick up Dawn, to watch her, I needed somebody to be there with me when the doctor came out. You didn't answer."
"Oh Buffy, I'm so sorry," he replied, and that was honest and she believed him but it didn't feel like enough either. "But why didn't you try again? It's been three days, certainly…"
"You're right, it has been three days," she said, standing up abruptly and brushing off her skirt. "I haven't heard from anyone - what have you guys been doing?"
"Oh, erm," her Watcher blustered, taking off his glasses for a polish, and Willow and Xander blushed and shifted nervously while Anya watched silently but closely.
"Sorry, Buff," Xander muttered, looking at his shoes, and Willow nodded in agreement. "We didn't know."
"Spike didn't know either," Dawn mused innocently, examining her nails and ignoring Buffy's glare. "He found out because he cared enough to come and check on us. Go figure."
"What?" Xander snapped, immediately jumping in and Buffy rolled her eyes. That was exactly what Dawn had wanted of course, goading him into barking, but it was way too easy. "What was Spike doing here? I thought he left!"
"He was doing exactly what Dawn said," Buffy answered back easily, trying to force all of her emotion to drain out of her feet. She'd had just about enough of this and she just didn't care anymore. "He came to check on us."
"Yeah and what'd he do that for?" the young man asked with a bitter sneer.
And that was it.
Enough.
The anger came exploding back like a volcano blasting apart, hot and fast and violent.
"Because he cared!" she snarled back, losing her cool at last. "He cared enough to come see how we were and when he found out he knew exactly what was wrong with my mom and he stayed and he answered the phones and he made breakfast and I love him!"
The silence that followed was so thick she couldn't have put a stake through it.