I want to beat you to death with a blunt object
I want to get one of those high end fashion mannequins grab them by the ankles and bash your ribcage in
I want to sharpen 5 pencils, bind them with a rubber band, put them in your mouth and punch the erasers
I want to strap you to a bead of nails then strap that bed of nails to the hood of my car so I can watch you suffer as we drive over speed bumps on a mall parking lot during an earthquake
I want you to somehow survive a terrible car crash and somehow not survive a small fender bender on the way back from the hospital.
Dad~ Bo Burnham
Sun. Bright. Too bright... what- noise? Ring, ring, ring... oh right. Alarm. Buffy woke slowly, wiping sleep from her eyes, as her free hand hit the objects on her locker blindly till it found its target. Tuesday. Tuesdays were bad. The weekend was well and truly gone, but Friday was still a barely-there light in the distance. Buffy often thought that it was Tuesday, not Monday, that was the worst day of the week.
She hopped into the shower, going over her schedule for the day. Survive till lunch. Survive some more. Study with Willow. Fun, fun, fun! She pulled on her outfit of choice, and trudged down stairs to the kitchen.
"'Morning." She muttered darkly to her mother as she began to pour the first cereal she came into contact with. Joyce raised an eyebrow in amusement.
"Good morning, Buffy."
After the necessary niceties were exchanged they went back to their respective reading of newspaper and fighting the urge to fall asleep into Bran. Once the coffee began to kick in, Joyce braved the abyss that was conversation with her eldest daughter.
"Anything special today?"
Buffy panicked for a moment, struggling to remember if there was a birthday, anniversary or likewise event she could be punished for forgetting.
"...no?" she asked nervously, trying to judge from her mother's expression if she should run.
"Oh. I was just wondering." Joyce answered, taking another sip of her latte.
Buffy breathed a sigh of relief. They fell into silence again, until they were greeted by a bleary eyed Dawn.
"Hey!" Buffy greeted cheerfully and was thrown a death glare in response. She met her mother's eye across the table, and shrugged, reflecting her mother's bemused smile. Suddenly, there was a loud honk from outside.
"It even sounds cheap." Joyce muttered worriedly. Buffy laughed.
"Don't tell Xander that, you'll break his heart." She answered, swinging her bag onto her left shoulder.
"Bye, I'll see you later- Oh! Might be late, studying with Willow. Bye Dawn!"
"What?" Dawn answered, blinking suddenly, like she was half asleep again. Buffy decided that was the extent of sisterly affection she could expect for the morning and skipped out the door into the early sunshine.
"What can compare with a Californian fall?" she sang, as she jumped into Xander's old Ford.
"You're chipper." Xander observed, eyeing her suspiciously.
"Today's going to be a good day." Buffy decided, as she relaxed into the musty seat.
Today was not a good day.
Actually it had been, up until lunch, when Buffy was finally able to catch up with Willow. Her best fried was, of course, in all advanced-placement classes, leaving poor Buffy and Xander to fend for themselves most of the time. Buffy dumped herself opposite Willow and Oz, who seemed caught in their own little world until Buffy coughed loudly. Willow did her usual blush-y thing, while Oz gave her a nonchalant "hey".
"Whatcha doin'?" Buffy asked, simultaneously trying to read Willow's writing upside down.
"Oh, I was just deciding what we'd go over later. See, I thought we'd start with Chem, 'cause that's what you both missed yesterday, because of Snyder." she said eagerly, though she had the good grace to look sympathetic at the hell-demon's name.
"Cool. What time do you- we both? Who 'both'?" She asked, almost missing the implied second person. Willow did the wide-eyed look she always had while she was grasping for words.
"Um, yeah, I'm tutoring somebody else at the same time, y-you don't mind, right?" Willow answered, but there was something in her oh-so-innocent expression that made Buffy feel she was dancing around something. Or rather, someone.
"I don't mind. It's just, you said 'you both', but the only other person at Snyder's was... no! World of no!" Buffy gasped in horror, the realization of who giving her an instant headache.
"Spike?! Willow what were you... why? How?!" Buffy half shrieked, half hissed.
"Hey." Oz warned, instantly becoming protective as Willow floundered.
"He came to me!," Willow rushed, "He's in the same boat as you, has to get a C minus and all, and after, you know, May..." She finished, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. The table fell silent.
"He did kind of save our asses." Oz reminded carefully.
"'Was his fault our asses needed saving." Xander muttered, poking moodily at his lasagna.
"Well technically it was-" Anya began, but the trio stared her into silence.
Willow shifted uncomfortably in her seat, watching Buffy with pleading eyes.
"Fine!," Buffy groaned, as Willow gave a little victory dance, happy at the avoided confrontation, "But I don't have to be, ew, nice to him do I?"
Willow's eyes grew wide.
"I hadn't thought of that. It shouldn't matter, I'm going to be mean."
"Willow, you're not capable of meanness." Buffy reminded while the gang nodded in agreement. Willow gave a little shrug.
"True- but I'll be really unhelpful, I won't even make him a study-chart." She said, her eyes narrowing in determination.
"Yeah Will, that'll show him!", Xander said giving a sarcastic thumbs-up, before turning back to the gang in general, "So, who's up for smuggling Buffy in a gun?"
"Time goes fast when you're having fun", they say. What is less often said is that time also goes fast when you're dreading something with all your heart and soul. Nothing could have made a double period of Trig and an hour of French go faster than the prospect of an afternoon with freaking William Pratt. So, when the time came for Buffy to actually enter the library, she kind of... froze.
She couldn't survive this.
Wait, yes she could. She survived that extra-wiggy-almost-normal conversation with him yesterday right? And a whole Summer of awkward meetings at the mall, or the Bronze. All she had to do now was endure an hour of listening to Willow while being in close proximity to his stupid, pasty face.
And on that note, Buffy pushed open the doors. Inside, Willow was sitting nervously, her hands folded protectively over her books her book, shooting apprehensive glances at Spike.
The man of the hour was sprawled over one of the benches, and Buffy would have thought he was sleeping if it weren't for his twitching hand. She assumed he was itching for a smoke, the two hours in between lunch and now being too long a gap. Great, she had a frustrated and nicotine deprived Spike to deal with.
Wasn't life just great like that?
With life loving her the way it did, Spike, of course, noticed her first.
"Great we can start, the Slayer's graced us with her divine presence at last. Red, start with the teaching!"
Willow jumped and gave Buffy a jumpy little wave. They all started when the doors swung open again, the school librarian, and probably Buffy's favorite member of staff, Giles walked through, juggling a heavy looking stack of books and a mug of tea.
"Hello Buffy, Willow, Xan- You're not Xander." He stated more than questioned, eyeing Spikes boots, that were currently resting on the table, with suspicion.
"William Pratt. To what do I-", he stopped with a sigh. "Why are you here Spike?" He asked, almost accusingly, dumping the pile of books on his desk.
"'M being a good citizen. Contributing to society, becoming somebody. The American Dream and all that tosh." Spike said with mock eagerness, swinging his feet off the table, narrowly missing Willow's bottle of water. Giles' expression blackened further.
"Indeed. Buffy, if blood is spilled I expect you to clean it out of the carpet." He said, as he walked into his office, shutting the door behind him pointedly.
"Will do!", Buffy answered as she swung into the space closest to Willow while being furthest away from Spike. Her efforts didn't go unnoticed by him and he rolled his eyes dramatically.
"Why don't you get some maturity Summers?" He said, his voice coming out like a snarl. Buffy smiled sweetly.
"I did, but it ran away with your dignity. What the hell are you doing here?"
Spike gestured to the books, as if it was obvious.
"I'm here to learn Slayer, an' you're preventing' it," He pointed to one of the anti-bullying signs on the wall, "Deliberate prevention of education is a form of bullying, did you know that Summers? You're a bully. Ought to report you, I should."
Buffy narrowed her eyes, but a pleading look from Willow stopped the insult that was dancing on her tongue. She settled into her seat and Willow opened her book, quickly turning into Teacher-Willow.
"Okay what you missed yesterday is really simple..."
"...and then you double check that both sides of the equation are equal and you're done!"
Willow looked up, her happy smile faltering when she saw Buffy and Spike's identical blank expressions.
"Oh come on guys, really?" She said, un-Willow like exasperation filling her voice.
"'M sorry Red, I was right there with you, up until the... equation part." Spike muttered, reading over his scrawled rough work.
Willow's expression darkened.
"All of it was the equation part."
"It's okay Willow really, it's just I think I speak for me and, uh, Spike, when I say huh?"
Spike nodded.
"For once I agree with the Slayer-"
"Not my name." Buffy interrupted. Spike ignored her.
"huh is a perfectly good description of my thoughts here. If you could just explain this CO2 malarkey again-"
"Carbon Dioxide. Even I knew that Pratt." Buffy hissed, though proud that she remembered that at least.
"I know Slayer, could you please take your head out of your ass for a moment?" Spike said, snarling again.
"But how else would I see your face every day?" Buffy said innocently, starting slightly when Spike jumped out of his chair.
"That's it Slayer, you, me, right now. Show me some of those nancy-boy yoga moves Peaches taught you." Spike said, bouncing on his feet, his hands balled into fists. Willow backed away into the corner.
What Buffy lacked in the brains department, she made up for in martial arts, a fact that quickly spread around Sunnydale, and Buffy often wondered if that was why she had so much trouble with boys. She was dangerously good, and it was another contributor to the nickname Slayer.
"It was tai chi" Buffy said threateningly as she stood up slowly from the table. Spike was still hopping around, a strange intensity in his eyes.
"Give me a reason Spike, I'm dying for a good fight."
She threw a mock punch, intending to miss. To give him credit, Spike didn't flinch.
He's been hit before, Buffy thought absentmindedly. There were so many wannabe punks going around, pretending to be old tortured souls. She had assumed Spike wasn't any different. Did it make a difference to her, that he might have some shady past? No, she quickly decided, swinging back into fighting stance.
"Try again Slayer, you know you want to." Spike practically purred, moving so close to her that Buffy considered simply kneeing him in the balls. Instead she pulled back her fist again, letting it fly.
His reflexes were too quick, and he grabbed her fist, twisting her arm painfully. He laughed at her grunt of pain, and Buffy threw him a look of loathing. A wide grin was spread across his too-pale face, and his eyes were dilated almost fully- wait was he getting off on this?
She was about to give in to that kneeing-in-the-balls idea when-
"Summers! Pratt! What the hell do you think you're doing?" Snyder virtually screamed, materializing out of no where. They leaped apart, Spike fixing his jacket, and Buffy smoothing back her ponytail.
"We were just-" Buffy began, struggling to find an answer.
"Dancing." Spike finished, that wicked look beginning to reappear on his face again. Snyder's eyes narrowed.
"Dancing?" He repeated, and Buffy swore she could actually see his hair line receding even further.
"Yeah, "She answered, "Homecoming's coming up and Willow was just teaching us the, um, waltz?" She finished weakly. She could feel Spike rolling his eyes.
"Rosenberg! Were they dancing?" Snyder shouted, noticing Willow for the first time.
Willow made a squeaking noise and nodded her head. Snyder turned back to them suspiciously.
"I don't believe you. But you can both dance together at counselling tomorrow morning. No questions!" He added when Buffy and Spike began to protest.
"You two will work out... whatever this is. There will not be another blip on your files, or I swear you'll both be singing bible songs this time next year. Go straight to my office in the morning, and then into counselling. Together."
He gave them a final sneer, before spinning on his heel and marching out the door. Spike knocked his books into his bag, and snatched his duster of the table.
"Looks like we've got a date Summers," He said, casually walking backwards out of the library, "wear something pretty."
He almost dodged the book Buffy threw at him. Almost.
A/N: Hi again! So, here's chapter 2. Big thanks to everyone who followed or reviewed. I'm sure you all know by now that reviews are any author's life blood, so keep 'em coming. Feel free to ask questions, or give me theories! See you all next week!