We got outside and started down the sidewalk towards the residential part of Sunnydale. Once we had gotten past the traffic, and had stopped passing people, I closed my eyes and leaned into Faith a little more. This lack of walking thing was tiring too. My goodness, I really hate throwing up. My legs felt like Jell-O still. I don't even like Jell-O. It moves on its own, and that's just too weird for me.

Faith stopped and looked down at me. I stared up at her pleadingly. She sighed and made sure my arm was securely around her neck before bending over to gather my legs in her other arm so that she was carrying me. I smiled slightly and nuzzled my head into the crook of her neck. Her shampoo smelled like flowers. I heard her chuckle.

"What?" I asked innocently.

"Well, first you order a drink that you know you're allergic to. Then you throw up, make a scene, and make me carry you home. It seems to me that it was all a big plan to get me to take care of you."

"Um, excuse me? I am too lazy to think that much about being lazy," I snickered.

"Are you always this confusing?" she asked.

"Mostly. But I'm less confusing than Angel, which is a plus."

"Yeah. How's Fang Gang doin' these days?" I had forgotten that she doesn't really like to talk about Angel. She gets this look on her face like she wants to throw up. I didn't want to make her feel like that, especially since I had just had a nasty reminder of how that feels.

"You know, it's not going too well lately. I think he's going to leave after graduation. He just seems like he's plotting some new heartbreak."

"Color me stunned. He has to do something with all that brooding daylight time he has," she grinned. I laughed and tightened my grip around her shoulders.

"I'm glad that I have you, Faith. It's no fun being the 'one girl in all the world.'"

"Tell me about it, blondie."

"Ok. So, before you, I had no one to talk to that had any idea about what I was going through because, hello! Superpowers now! And Giles is never helpful with anything except evil-y stuff and Angel is always all broody and Willow has Oz and Xander and Cordelia are – whatever they are, and now there's Anya, and there is no one that knows or cares about what's happening to me."

"Uh, that's great B, but, you know that's just a figure of speech, right?" she smirked.

"Oh. Haha. Yeah. I just thought—"

"—That I'd listen?" She looked down at me with a genuine expression, one that said that she really would listen and that she cared.

"Well yeah, you don't really have a choice. I mean, you could drop me and leave me on the curb, but who could leave this poor little girl all alone with nothing to fend off all the evil that lurks in this town when the fast-approaching darkness – er – approaches?"

I gave her my best puppy-dog look but she wasn't buying it. Not this time. She laughed at me. She has such a wonderful laugh; it made me want to laugh with her. I didn't though. I just smiled and put my head close to her neck.

We traveled a few more blocks. If I didn't know any better, I would have said that she had been going deliberately slow. There was so much that I didn't know about this girl; so much that I wanted to know.

All too soon we got to my street. I could see the mailbox peeking out onto the street. It was a miracle that it was still fully intact. There had been so many fights in our front yard; I couldn't imagine how the mailbox constantly escaped damage.

"I guess I should drop you off here," she said. She had spoken so softly that I almost didn't hear her.

"Why?" I asked, confused. She went on to mutter something about my mom being all welcoming and uncomfortable and how she had to get back to her motel room. I raised my head to look at her and she misunderstood the gesture and thought I was letting her go and wanted to be put down. Not so much. Once she had put me down, I feigned falling over. She caught me and held me tight against her so that I wouldn't fall again.

"Oh, my head. The lactose makes me throw up and then it makes me really dizzy. I don't think I can make it all the way home," I said, lying through my teeth. She knew I was lying. She could see it when I looked up into her eyes, but to my surprise she decided to play along. Her eyes got a mysterious twinkle in them as she scooped me up into her arms again.

"Really?" she asked. I nodded. She paused for a moment and then held me tighter as she spun in circles all the way down the street. I couldn't help giggling. This made me feel like a little girl.

We got into my yard and she narrowly missed spinning into the mailbox. She staggered, trying to figure out what she had almost hit, and then I found myself tumbling to the ground – still held in her arms. At least she cushioned the fall.

She landed flat on her back with me on top of her. I tried to move off of her so she could regain the air that had been knocked painfully out of her lungs by my arm, but I was dizzy still and I ended up flopping down with my head on her shoulder and one of my arms and both of my legs slung over her torso. My other arm wrapped neatly around my waist as if it were the most natural position in the world.

As the dizziness subsided with our laughter, I found myself reveling in the silence that had washed over us. It was nice, just laying here.

"Can you breathe again?" I asked tentatively breaking the quiet.

"I think so. I think I'm going to have a permanent Buffy-shaped bruise all over me though," she grinned.

"You make that sound like it's a bad thing." I could barely get the sentence out without laughing. "Faith?" I asked quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Will you – I mean – do you want to stay for dinner, or you know, we could just have a movie night or something. That's what we were planning on doing with Willow; so, we could still do it if you wanted. I have lots of popcorn," I was practically begging. It was fun to hang out with Faith; she really understood stuff.

Faith didn't say anything for a bit. Eventually I moved my head so that I was looking up at her face, and when I did so, I found that she was looking down at me with a smile on her face.

"Um, I'll take that as a 'yes,'" I said. She nodded. "But that means we have to get up." She frowned at that.

"Yeah I guess your mom must think we're drunk or sumthin' all collapsed on the lawn," she continued to frown.

"Mom's not home. She's in LA, buying stuff for The Gallery. So, turn that frown up-side down missy, because there is no parent to advise us about our 'parental-advisory' movies tonight." She smiled. She had a stunning smile. How did she get her teeth to stay so white?

Before I knew it, she had moved out from under my legs and was standing up. Just as suddenly, she leaned over me, reaching for my hands to pull me up. I accepted her offer and found myself almost falling into her arms, she had pulled me so hard. She had to brace her leg behind her so we wouldn't topple onto the ground again.

"Sorry," I muttered. Truthfully, I wasn't that sorry. I didn't mind being so close to her. I could feel her when she was near me; it must have been the shared slayer power. Although, I don't remember feeling it when Kendra was around. The feeling itself is hard to explain. It's kind of like the feeling of drinking hot chocolate when you're really cold, and you can feel the heat go all the way down your throat and spread out into your stomach. It was like that only everywhere. And that was just when she walked into a room. When she was right next to me, it felt as if my heart was pumping out lava instead of blood. The weird thing is that it was never too hot; it was just – comforting, almost; like a fire in the fireplace on Christmas. I guess that it could get as dangerous as tangible fire was, but I don't think it ever will. I think it will always be comfy, Christmas-y fire.

She snapped me out of my thoughts by waving a hand in front of my face.

"Yo, B! Where'd you go?"

"Hmm? Oh, nothing," I lied.

---

To be continued. Thanks for reading!