Author's Note: This latest chapter was inspired by vidicon's 'Odd thoughts' story, Chapter 21 'Resistance' on Twisting the Hellmouth. Particularly helpful were the last two paragraphs:

"Mimi Labonq. You're Mimi Labonq, and he's… General Crabtree, of the SOE!" Willow managed to gasp. "I did a paper on you!"

"And it's amazing that he got there, the way he mangles French," Mimi muttered. "That reminds me, Buffy. Since I'll be here for a lot longer than we expected, we shall schedule regular French lessons."

When Kenneth Crabtree, formerly known as General Crabtree walked into their daughter Joyce's guest bedroom, he found his wife in there sitting at a side table to be as extremely depressed as he'd only rarely seen her in this couple's decades of married life together. It was true that the old man was quite capable of overlooking Mimi's feelings on many other occasions, but not when she was at present holding in a somewhat wobbly hand a bottle of Pernod of which this bleary-eyed lady had obviously already consumed a good third of that pastis liquor.

Stopping dead in his tracks, Crabtree worriedly regarded his well-sloshed wife and cleared his throat before risking, "Is something wrong, dear?"

Menacingly pointing the Pernod bottle at her idiot of a husband, Mimi snarled towards him, "Over the years, I've had to listen to a good many foreigners butchering the beautiful speech of my native land: les anglais—"

She took a good swig of pastis, to then continue, "—les Américains—"

Another swig equal to the last mouthful resulted in, "—les putains de boches—"

That required a much deeper swig, causing Mimi to rasp after that, "—dieu nous en préserve, les Australiens."

She paused to glance at the now half-empty bottle, before evidently deciding with a shudder that even downing the entire remainder of the bottle's contents in one go couldn't wipe out the horrible memory of that long-ago event.

Switching back her attention to a bewildered Crabtree, Mimi told him, "But our oldest granddaughter somehow manages to be even worse at speaking my birth language than all of them put together! I had to cut short our latest lesson today before I completely lost my temper! She makes you sound like the most respected member of the Académie Française!"

"Ah," Crabtree cautiously nodded. He scratched at his chin in serious thought.

A few moments later, the former WWII covert operative suggested, "Have you tried encouraging Buffy with, I don't know, some kind of reward if she gets the words right?"

Mimi dubiously regarded her husband as if he'd just started speaking in tongues. "What possible reward could bring that about? No, mon amour, it's completely hope—"

In the middle of her doleful statement, Mimi cut herself off to instead stare in dawning wonder at the other person in the room. Leaping up from her chair, the Frenchwoman dashed over to Crabtree and ecstatically flung both arms around his waist, as high up as the diminutive lady could manage.

At the same time, a joyous Mimi beamed up at the man she was embracing, "Oh, you're such a genius, chéri! That's exactly what I'm going to do!"

However, instead of looking suitably pleased at receiving both this wifely praise and a fond hug, Crabtree inexplicably yelped in sudden surprise, along with twisting his neck to look over his shoulder. Though, he didn't actually need to observe how the woman he'd wed had just accidentally upended her Pernod bottle so that the rest of the booze there promptly poured out to thoroughly drench this grandfather's posterior.

He could feel his soaked pants quite nicely, thank you very much.

All too aware that everyone else living here had earlier found some reason to not stick around for today's Saturday morning, Buffy Summers glumly entered the Revello Drive house's living room. She did this with all the enthusiasm of what's-his-name from Sunnydale High's literature class, that guy in the Dickens book about to have his head chopped off at Paris right after he made his whole sad speech the teacher insisted on reading out aloud to the bored students.

Come to think about it, Bonmaman had once said her folks had been living there in Paris around then. Buffy was totally sure a few grandmothers ago in the past, one of them had been gleefully knitting along with Madame Defarge and criticizing how slow the guillotine was working today. Just let her join in, and falling aristocratic heads would be bouncing everywhere—

"Buffy," Bonmaman nodded at the Slayer to take her seat in the main table across from the older woman already in her own chair. Not looking forward the slightest about yet another doomed-to-failure French lesson, this resigned girl nonetheless did as she'd been told.

Although, the first hint that things might be different from yesterday was revealed to Buffy by Bonmaman's determined gleam shown in a pair of rather bloodshot eyes.

With growing confusion, Buffy heard from her grandmother, "Chéri, we're going to try something new. I'll show you what I recently bought at home to wear here, and then describe these in French. You repeat the words after me. If you say them wrong, I'll step backwards until you get it right. Keep saying the words correctly, and I'll come forward. If you manage to pull off what your Banpopo calls 'spot-on', you win the prize!"

"What prize, Bonmaman?" began a mystified Buffy towards where her grandmother had just gotten up from her chair to then lean down towards the floor to pick up something resting there. The Slayer couldn't see whatever Bonmaman was retrieving, what with the table in the way—

Buffy's mental processes instantly screeched to a complete stop, her mouth falling open over recognizing what her grandmother was proudly displaying in both hands: the absolutely most darling set of navy satin pumps from the latest high-fashion Paris designer! Best of all, they were in her size!

Smirking at her enthralled granddaughter, Mimi had to inwardly marvel that she hadn't tried this before. Well, now was the time and it couldn't help but succeed, so advance to the next part of the plan.

"Chéri, repeat after me: Shoes…chaussures."

Still dreamily gazing at the magnificence borne by Bonmaman, Buffy's mouth opened and she mispronounced in a supremely execrable French accent, "Chowsers."

Wincing, Mimi took a step back.

Buffy's own eyes widened in abrupt horror. Those lovely shoes were leaving! Frantically, she tried again, "Chaussers!"

Mimi considered this. The start had been promising enough, but Buffy's latest attempt wasn't quite on the mark at the word's ending even though it still meant shoes. The older woman thought however that deserved a little bonus, so she took a half-step towards her granddaughter.

Something clicked into place in the Slayer's brain. Attempting to imitate Bonmaman again, this time Buffy Summers accomplished it perfectly with the correct nasal tone: "Chaussures!"

"Formidable!" happily declared Bonmaman. She handed over the shoes, which Buffy then proceeded to cuddle in her arms and croon over as if they were her very own child.

Watching this, Mimi was so pleased with herself that she unthinkingly mentioned under her breath something about that gift which she'd ordinarily never have said aloud to her granddaughter. Alas, she forgot just how keen a Slayer's hearing was.

Without even looking up from her gaze covetously running over and over the adorable footwear she was hugging, Buffy repeated perfectly once more in Mimi's own accent:

"Ton grand-père adore me regarder ne portant que des chaussures bleues."

The next couple of moments while gloating over her latest prezzy, Buffy had to pause in this to frown and look over at where the muffled choking sound she'd just heard had come from.

For some reason, the wrinkled but still pretty visage of the older woman standing there was now bright red in genuine embarrassment.

Concerned, Buffy had to ask her, "Is something wrong, Bonmaman? I said that right, didn't I?"

"Ahhh," Mimi had to concede, "Yes, chéri, you did. That was a bit too…advanced, I think. Let us stay with simpler phrases for now. Oh, and you needn't mention that one to Banpopo, either. It'll be our little secret."

Not sure what'd just happened but perfectly willing to agree with Bonmaman as long as she could keep the shoes, Buffy eagerly nodded.

"Bien!"

Further Author's Note: "Ton grand-père adore me regarder ne portant que des chaussures bleues" when translated into English means "Your grandfather loves watching me wearing nothing but those blue shoes."