Faith had expected Buffy to fully take advantage of the opportunity for a shower, no matter how crappy the experience was compared to other showers available in the world. She had figured Buffy would likely use up all the soap and shampoo, what limited qualities were available, and had already resigned herself to a very cold shower with terrible water pressure. Still, it would beat prison showers, since presumably, she would at the very least be able to expect that no one would attempt to stab her with a skiv or feel her up. But Buffy was again surprising in her actions. It was only about twenty minutes when Faith heard the water turn off, and the faint sounds of Buffy stepping out and going through the motions of drying herself and her hair with the threadbare towels available.
Faith averted her eyes, sternly commanding herself not to flush when Buffy reemerged into the room, clad only in a rather short and skimpy towel. Still, her hands unconsciously gripped the blanket of the bed, and she took a quick breath in and out as Buffy addressed her.
"Shower's free."
Faith nodded acknowledgement, standing and making her way past Buffy towards the now vacant bathroom. Buffy didn't move aside to give her more room to pass by, and it was Faith who had to turn sideways in an effort to avoid touching her. She couldn't help a quick glance towards the other woman, and she noted the tight muscles of Buffy's calves and thighs, the prominence of her collar bone above the towel and the clearly diminished size of her breasts, as no cleavage showed even with the smallness of the towel. Buffy's hair still dripped slightly down her back, and when she moved it over one shoulder, Faith could see the wings of her shoulder blades, showing more clearly than she could remember from before.
While time and increased work outs in prison had filled Faith out, adding to her already natural curvy, muscular frame, the past few years seemed to have whittled Buffy into the bare essentials of size. Faith wondered with some reluctance just how often the woman remembered or bothered to eat, and how many hours of sleep she could manage or allow for herself. How long had it been since she actually took care of herself, or since someone else had noticed that she wasn't?
It wasn't her damn business, not if Buffy didn't make it her business. If none of her friends were handling it, or if Buffy wouldn't let them in enough to try, then she sure as fuck wasn't going to let Faith.
Faith made her way into the bathroom, wrinkling her nose at the damp puddles in stained tile that Buffy's footprints had left on the floor and the yellowed hue of the toilet and sink. Still, she'd been right, it was a step up from some of her previous "homes," so she set out a towel as a makeshift bath mat and stepped up into the shower, testing the water pressure and temperature before turning on the shower.
The water was cold, as she had expected, but she didn't think it was Buffy's fault, given the limited length of her shower. Nevertheless, Faith closed her eyes, enjoying the feel of the dirt and blood loosening and sloughing off her skin and out of her hair. She took her time, using the tiny shreds of soap and few ounces of shampoo available to the maximum benefit, until every last bit was down the drain. Feeling much more alert and alive when she at last determined herself somewhat clean, she turned the water off with some reluctance, stepping out onto the towel and beginning to dry herself off.
It wasn't until she was mostly dry that she realized a problem now presented. Her battle clothes were still filthy and stiff from the day's grueling events, yet they were the only clothing at the moment that she had in her possession. She didn't relish the thought of putting those clothes on her now clean body. What exactly was she supposed to sleep in?
Wrapping herself in a towel, she stuck her head out the bathroom door, quickly seeing that Buffy seemed to be facing the same issue. The girl was still standing in her own towel, but her attention was now focused with clear distaste on her discarded, equally disgusting clothing.
Faith raised her eyebrows, then cleared her throat, obtaining the other girl's attention. As Buffy looked up at her, half turning to face her, Faith became newly aware of the fact that both of them were clad only in towels, and not standing so very far away from each other either. Biting down hard on the inside of her lips to keep from making the automatic sexually charged jokes that immediately rose to mind, she instead nodded towards Buffy's clothes, giving a somewhat uncomfortable smirk.
"I'm gonna go ahead and guess that with all the prepping for battle, none of us actually remembered to prep for possible survival, with things like toothbrushes and deodorant and, like, some kind of clothes that aren't crusted in bodily fluids?"
Buffy sighed aloud, her head inclining in a reluctant nod.
"I'm pretty sure that's accurate. At least on my part."
"Hey, if you wanna go knocking on Giles's door or one of the Potentials to check if they happened to carry along some spares, be my guest," Faith offered, this time allowing herself permission to zero her gaze pointedly to Buffy's towel. "It's gonna be amusing, given your current attire and all, so don't blame me if I watch at the window."
Buffy sighed again, rolling her eyes, and didn't dignify the comment with an answer. She frowned slightly, appearing to be considering her options briefly, before she huffed aloud, turning her eyes back towards Faith.
"Like I said, we're both grown women. With all the shit I've lived through and as many times as I've been brought back to life when I didn't, I'm pretty sure I can handle sleeping in my underwear for a night. If I'd stuck it out through college, there'd probably be a few drunken blackouts that weren't so far off the mark from this anyway, so I'll take it as a sample of the more normal craziness I missed out on. As long as you aren't stricken by some overwhelming urge to molest me in my sleep, I think I can handle you sleeping in underwear too."
And before Faith could quite process this declaration or exactly what it was going to entail, Buffy was dropping her towel, standing not quite a foot away from her completely bare and apparently without any shyness or self-consciousness about the fact. Faith couldn't stop her eyes from widening, her mouth dropping slightly, as Buffy turned her back on her, gingerly sifting through her clothing to fish out the bra and underwear she had just referenced. She dressed herself, still turned away from Faith, then shifted back towards her, lifting an eyebrow when she saw that Faith had not yet made a move to follow suit.
"Unless you're thinking a towel is more comfortable nightwear, and I'm going to have to disagree with you on that. I'm pretty sure the material just gave me a rash."
"What? No, whatever, it's your call, B," Faith said hastily, giving a faint laugh that sounded a little hesitant to her own ears. "I'm good with whatever."
Inwardly she flinched, noticing belatedly that the statement could definitely be taken in more ways than one, and she hadn't intended to go there with Buffy. Not now, not today. But if Buffy saw the possibility, she ignored it, turning back to her clothes to kick them out of her way. She walked over to the bed, stretching out on one side atop the blanket and closing her eyes, perhaps as much to prove her lack of interest in Faith's state of undress as because of her genuine tiredness.
Faith paused another moment, making sure that Buffy wasn't suddenly going to change her mind. Buffy made no gesture to speak up or stop her, so she slowly dropped her own towel, then retrieved her own underclothing, dressing herself with occasional glances in Buffy's direction. The other girl remained still on the bed, her chest rising and falling slightly with her breaths, and when Faith was somewhat redressed again, she moved to join her on the bed slowly.
Every time she expected a mannerism or characteristic she remembered from the younger Buffy of her memories to surface, the Buffy of today managed to surprise her. Teenaged Buffy would have blushed and stammered at the very thought of being around Faith in her underwear, let alone actually sharing a bed in that state. Faith could not imagine any scenario where Buffy would be the one to initiate such a situation, let alone be the first to drop her clothes. She was pretty sure that even if dying of heatstroke in some abandoned desert, teenaged Buffy would have insisted on removing no more clothing that her socks and shoes. If that; teenaged Buffy might very well have worried about exposing less than perfectly manicured toenails.
But Buffy showed no indication of concern or discomfort now when Faith sat on the edge of the bed, again less than a foot away from her. She didn't even indicate awareness of her presence until Faith cleared her throat again, deliberately focusing her gaze on the wound at Buffy's side.
"It looks a little better. The stab wound. Still, you sure you don't need to bandage it up again?"
Buffy's hand drifted to touch it, giving no flinch despite the extent of the wound and the likely pain her touch would have caused. She opened her eyes, but didn't turn her head towards Faith when she answered her.
"It isn't bleeding anymore, there isn't a need."
"Nah, but it's still more or less an open wound," Faith pointed out. "You could get infected. And I'm pretty sure bedding in places like this is probably one of the top places where creepy diseases are likely to be spread around."
Buffy's hand drifted down to rest on a hip, and Faith noted with some discomfort just how much its bone jutted out in her supine position on the bed. Her ribs were more visible than she would have liked, too, and she quickly moved her eyes up to the safer area of Buffy's face.
"I'll take my chances," Buffy replied, her voice sounding distant, even from only inches away. "Besides, I'm pretty sure this isn't the kind of place where it's really smart to go knocking on doors in your underwear."
Faith chuckled at that, conceding the point.
"Yeah, probably. But anyone stupid enough to mess with you, it's not like you couldn't kick their ass."
"Yeah, but I don't want to have to," Buffy countered, her voice soft. "Not tonight. Maybe not ever, now."
Faith regarded her, her brows knitting. This was yet another comment that didn't sit well with her, one she didn't know how to answer. She had never been the kind of girl who was good at giving pep talks or comfort, and she had enough history of mental issues herself to be able to pass judgment or give any kind of advice in that kind of thing in others. What the hell did she know, when it came to depression?
But that was what it sounded like, every time Buffy said something in that tone of voice, with that lack of caring or drive. That was what she saw in her diminished body and her expressionless face. Faith hadn't shown it in the same way, that was for sure. But she was pretty damn familiar with how it felt to be depressed, to be unable to come up with a single reason to wake up to one more day or fight to get somewhere different in life. She was no doctor or shrink, but that didn't mean she couldn't see in Buffy the same bleak, encompassing feeling of darkness she'd lived in before, the same darkness that rose up in her sometimes even now, whenever she let down her guard.
But how the hell did you come out and say that to someone, let alone to Buffy Summers? How do you warn her not to become anything close to yourself?
So Faith slipped back into what was more comfortable for her- sarcasm, with something of a biting edge.
"Hey, B, now we've got matching scars. Guess that's how they'll know we're the originals. Or maybe it's just karma."
She waited for Buffy to roll her eyes, to make some snappy remark about Faith's evil past and poor choices, or maybe, just maybe to smile. But Buffy just nodded, one small inclination of her head.
"Maybe. Seems to be a thing."
Faith's eyes drifted down to regard herself, taking in her own cut and bruised skin, mostly exposed in her current attire to Buffy's view. She took in the damage with dispassion, satisfied that she was already healing, and there appeared to be no lasting damage. Nevertheless, she felt sore and achy in an acute, much more noticeable manner than before. All traces of adrenaline high from the battle that had managed to block out physical pain had finally left her system, and she felt heavier than the actual weight that her body took up in space.
Not quite consciously, her hand moved to cover the scar at her stomach she had referenced. This, unlike the others, would never entirely fade, let alone heal into nonexistence. Faith's own knife, the mayor's gift, had gone in deep, Buffy's stabbing intended to kill. She had nearly been successful, and for a time, Faith had wished she had been.
She had wondered, once her feelings of hurt and betrayal had faded, if there had ever been a time, ever so briefly, where Buffy had regretted her actions, if she had ever felt even passing guilt. She hadn't expected an apology- god knows, Buffy had never seemed to be able to admit she was wrong about anything, especially when it came to Faith. It didn't seem all that likely to Faith that Buffy had; she had thought then, and probably still did now, that she had done The Right Thing, capital letters, that Faith had deserved death for the choices she had made. Still, it was a strange twist of fate that years later, Buffy would end up with a nearly identical scar, in the very same spot of the scar she had delivered upon Faith.
That didn't mean that it was easy for Faith to look at, her own long-healed wound, fresh and mirrored back at her on Buffy's skin. She took no enjoyment from it; in fact, it made her deeply uncomfortable. Buffy, she felt, unlike herself, didn't deserve that kind of lasting mark.
When Buffy didn't move her eyes back in Faith's direction, nor did she speak again, Faith exhaled, feeling a need to break the silence. As much as she had thought she craved peace and quiet in prison, and even in Buffy's house, Buffy's quiet made her feel twitchy inside, uneasy.
"Well, don't know about you, B, but I'm beat. You can leave the light on if you want, but I'm pretty sure I could sleep through a rock concert in the corner, about now."
When Buffy simply leaned over in response, reaching to switch off the light of the lamp on the nightstand near her, Faith took that to mean the other girl was ready for sleep too. Faith stood, pulling back the bed's blanket on her own side, and flipped the light back on from her own nightstand's lamp just long enough to inspect the sheets for suspicious stains or visible bugs. When she couldn't see any obvious nastiness on their surface, she nodded wordless acceptance, then flipped the light back off, sliding beneath them and wriggling to settle herself back against the sheets. She pushed at the pillow a few times, trying to plump it up out of its flattened state, and then relaxed her body back, closing her eyes.
Though her eyes were shut, she could sense the slight movements of Buffy standing beside her, then felt the slight coolness of the air as the other girl joined her under the blanket. The bed was large enough for each to have their own defined space, no need to touch or overlap, but Faith could nevertheless feel the heat of Buffy's body close to her own, and without their actual touching, she was very much aware of the shape and presence of her beside her.
"Night, B," she said, after a moment's debate. She kept her voice light as she continued, "Don't let the bed bugs bite, 'cause in this joint, that's probably a real hazard we'll be fighting."
She didn't really expect Buffy to answer, as uncommunicative as she had been throughout the day. But just as Faith felt herself on the very verge of sleep, she was pretty sure she heard the girl answer back, so softly she wasn't quite sure she hadn't imagined it.
"Good night."