I told you so. I told you so. I told you so.
Chapter 7: Family Talks
Buffy answered the knock on her front door with a frown. “Giles? What’s–” She stopped at the sight of the two men behind her watcher. “Um, hi?”
“Buffy, is your mother home?” Giles asked.
“Yeah, but–”
“Good.” Giles brushed by her and into the house, with Robin right behind him, leaving Buffy staring at the third member of the group, who was still on the porch.
He gestured toward the threshold. “Come on, Slayer. Just say it.”
“Nuh-uh.” She shook her head. “Nope.”
“Those two are gonna need some proof of what they’re telling her. I’m it.”
“That’s why you guys are storming my house? To tell my mom…?” She slammed the door in his face and followed Giles and Robin to the living room, where they were already settling in for a conversation with her mother. “Giles?” she asked, clenching her fists at her sides. “What is this?”
“Some very strong points have been made to me recently, regarding the value of breaking the rules in the interest of safety.”
“Safety?” Joyce frowned at her guests, then addressed her daughter. “Buffy, honey, why don’t you sit down? I gather this visit is about you. Are you involved in anything dangerous?”
“I can’t believe he talked you two into this. That pushy, know-it-all jerk…”
“Sometimes, he’s right.” Robin nodded in the direction of the door. “Why don’t you–”
“No.”
Giles gave her his best watcher glare. “Buffy…”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll invite him in. But if this little talk blows up in my face, I’m so going to kill you both.”
Joyce’s voice followed her as she left the living room. “Buffy Anne Summers! That is no way to speak to our guests! Your teacher and librarian deserve some respe…” She trailed off when she noticed the guests in question appeared undisturbed by Buffy’s comment. “That doesn’t bother you?”
Robin shrugged. “Death threats come with the territory.”
“Teaching teenagers?”
“Dealing with slayers.”
Joyce dropped her forehead into her palms. “Oh, no. Not this nonsense again. When she was released from the clinic, the doctors said she’d let go of those slayer and vampire delusions. I thought this was long over.” She lifted her head at the sound of an unfamiliar voice from the living room doorway.
“You hear that, Slayer? We’re delusions. Wish someone had told me that in 1880.”
Buffy, standing beside the stranger, glared at him. “You’re here to ruin the one part of my life that wasn’t already imploding, and you want to make jokes about it? Have I told you yet that I hate you?”
“Yeah, and this probably won’t be the last time.” Spike stepped into the room. “Mrs. Summers, it wasn’t a delusion. It’s all real. Slayers. Watchers. Demons.” He brought forth his fangs. “Vampires.”
Giles, Robin, and Buffy cringed at the pitch of Joyce’s reflexive scream.
Spike only chuckled. He shook back into his human face and settled into an armchair. “Nice to meet you, too.”
“You– You’re a–”
Buffy nodded. “Yeah. And a really pushy one, too. How exactly did you con my watcher into this?”
“He does make some excellent points, Buffy,” Giles argued. “And given the present circumstances, with this particular foe…”
“The big git’s fond of mind games, Slayer. Gets his rocks off. Your mum’s naught to him but something he can play against you. Get you weak and distracted.”
Buffy let herself drop onto the arm of the nearest chair, which happened to be the one Spike was occupying. “Alright, fine. Tell her whatever you need to, to keep her safe. But one of you will have to help me break out of the loony bin, so I can stake my ex.”
Spike patted her back. “That’s a good slayer. Keep focused on the mission.”
She turned to glare at him over her shoulder. “I still don’t remember hiring a spare watcher.”
Joyce was following the conversation with an expression that was a mixture of shock and confusion. “I’m not sure I understand.”
Giles cleared his throat. “Perhaps, Mrs. Summers, we should start at the beginning…”
While he spoke, with interjections from Spike, Robin, and Buffy, Joyce listened intently, trying very hard to make sense of it all.
Through the entire conversation, Spike’s hand never left Buffy’s back. He left it resting against her, his thumb rubbing small circles against her cotton top, a mindless action he wasn’t even fully aware of until she shifted her position on the arm of the chair. She leaned slightly against his hand, looking comfortable, despite her awkward perch. Spike’s thumb stopped moving at that point, but he didn’t withdraw his hand.
Robin, watching them from his seat at the end of the couch, was the only one in the room in a position to see it, and spent a significant portion of the conversation trying to fight back a knowing smile. He wasn’t the least bit surprised.
*~*~*
Robin’s silver Civic pulled into the Sunnydale High parking lot, stopping next to Giles’ Citroen. The three men said their good-nights, and Giles exited the car to climb into his own. Spike took the opportunity to move into the front passenger’s seat. The instant he closed the door, Robin burst into laughter.
Spike frowned at him. “What the hell?”
“Sorry, sorry. I’ve been holding that in for the past two hours.” Robin beat his open palm against the steering wheel in time to his chuckles as he tried to regain control of himself. Once he caught his breath, he turned to look Spike in the eye. “I told you so. I told you so. I told you so.”
“Told me what?”
“She’s your type. And you’re interested.”
“Why would you think that?”
“For one thing, you aren’t denying it. For another, you can’t keep your hands off her, even when you aren’t sparring.” He grinned, fighting back another laugh. “Hence, I told you so.”
Spike rolled his eyes. “Rocket, put this thing in drive and get us home. I think it’s past your bedtime.”
*~*~*
Joyce came to Buffy’s bedroom doorway and watched her in the very normal teenaged girl act of painting her toenails. She opened her mouth to speak, then abruptly turned away from the door. She nearly made it to her own bedroom door when she pivoted back, returning to Buffy’s. “Honey, I…”
Buffy looked up.
Joyce, still struggling for words, shook her head. “Never mind.” She turned away again.
Her daughter’s voice brought her back. “Mom, if you want to talk about this stuff, you kinda have to say so. And, you know, be in the same room with me.”
After another moment of hesitation, Joyce stepped gingerly into the bedroom and sat stiffly on the edge of the vanity stool. She watched Buffy change her position on the bedroom floor, taking care not to smear any nail polish while she switched her attentions to the other foot.
“I, um, I think I… I owe you an apology.”
“For locking me up?” Buffy asked, not looking up. “It sucked at the time, and I really wish you’d listened to me, but I kinda get it now. Sometimes my life sounds really crazy, even to me.”
“Mr. Giles offered to loan me some books on his way out, to help me understand more of…” Joyce’s gaze drifted around the room. “Of all the things I didn’t listen to.” She shook her head at herself. “I was growing concerned that your school librarian was overly solicitous. I had no idea you were working with him, or that neither of you is exactly who I thought.”
“I’m mostly who you thought I was, Mom. I’m just stronger than I look. And I get into life-or-death fights with demons pretty regularly.” She kept her eyes on her work, not wanting to see her mother’s reaction to that statement. “As for Giles, watchers basically have three jobs: research upcoming badness, train the slayer, and keep a record of her experience for the watchers and slayers that come after. That I got one that actually cares is a bonus.”
“And Mr. Wood… His mother was like you?”
“Yep. She made it to the ripe old age of 24. Not many last that long. Having help apparently makes a difference.”
Joyce fell silent, her other questions temporarily quashed by her daughter’s casual acknowledgment of her abbreviated lifespan. By the time she spoke again, Buffy had finished painting her toenails and was screwing the cap back onto the bottle. “Why you?” she finally whispered.
“Luck of the draw, I guess,” Buffy answered with a shrug. “But I have help, Mom, way more help than most slayers could ever dream of having. That’s why I’m not six feet under already, if you want the truth.”
“I do and I don’t.”
“I get that.”
Gathering her courage, Joyce resumed her earlier line of questioning. “I think I understand enough of the situation with Angel, that he turned from a good vampire to a bad one, and now he’s a danger to everyone. So you have to…. slay him. But this Spike… Is he a good vampire, too? I noticed there was no discussion about him having a soul, but all three of you appeared to be comfortable around him.”
Buffy shifted her position again, this time so she could lean against the side of the bed. “Yes and no. No soul. Sort of a good guy, at least where slayers are concerned. There’s some messy history there. But he’s a good enough guy that Giles trusts him, and Robin -Mr. Wood- obviously does, ’cause he’s known Spike pretty much his whole life.”
“What do you think of him?”
She was quick to answer. “We’ve been sparring a lot since he came to Sunnydale. That’s all.”
Joyce frowned. “That doesn’t tell me much, except that he’s violent.”
“So am I. Slayer. Vampire. It’s a violent thing.” Buffy wrinkled her nose as she tried to come up with a satisfactory answer. “I don’t really know. I mean, I get that he’s probably not going to turn on us overnight like Angel did. And it says a lot that Giles is cool with him. I just kinda feel like I shouldn’t trust him as much as I do. Like, instinctively. Not just ’cause he’s a vamp, and I’m sensing him every second he’s nearby, but I got the ‘soul equals trustworthy and no soul equals dangerous’ thing stuck in my head, and with all of this Angel stuff going on, it’s hard to shake it.” She offered her mother a playful shrug in an effort to lighten the moment. “It turns out things aren’t that simple. Who knew?”
“I may not understand all of this yet, honey, but I promise you, you’ll run into more situations like that. Very few things in life are as simple as they first appear.” Joyce gave her daughter a weak half-smile. “Parenting springs to mind.”
myrabeth 
I really love the conversation between Joyce and Buffy. It was good to see her apologize, and for Buffy to recognize why she was taken to the mental institution. So many people get pissed at Joyce for that and act like she was a bad mother for not listening to Buffy. The thing is, though, that she was actually being a good mother, there. She was worried that her child was having mental problems and wanted to get her help. It’s good to see Buffy acknowledge that while also still thinking it really sucked.
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