Buffy the Vampire Slayer 3

by Nancy Holder

  His joyful anticipation was only heightened when Spike caught his first glimpse of his beloved, her long black fur-trimmed coat barely concealing the bloodred gown that he’d found for her on their last visit to Paris, its plunging neckline gloriously accentuating the perfection of her pure white skin. As if that vision were not enough to set his flesh tingling, Dru was gently guiding a beautiful young girl with golden curls, clad in a frilly pink jumper, toward him, holding one of the child’s hands with the tips of her perfectly manicured nails.

  “Now, this is more like it, pet,” Spike cooed lovingly. “To what do I owe this incredible generosity? I know the young are your favorite. Did you actually save this little bit for me?”

  “Patience, love,” Dru replied, bending to whisper in the child’s ear.

  Savoring the anticipation of the delectable morsel to come, Spike wheeled himself a bit closer, stopping in horror only when the little girl’s face suddenly transformed into that of a vampire.

  “Callie,” Dru whispered softly, “say hello to your new daddy, Spike.”

  “Oh, sodding hell,” Spike sputtered.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Monday’s soccer practice had not gone well for Josh. He didn’t know if he was more distracted or exhausted, and the extra mile Coach Bradley had demanded he run at the end of the afternoon had done nothing to improve the situation. As much as he dreaded returning home, by nightfall he had little choice.

  Making his way through the backyard to his kitchen door, Josh slowed his steps, lost for a moment in the pleasant memory of a spring afternoon he’d spent picking grapefruit from his mother’s favorite tree that dominated much of the yard. Somewhere in his distant past were gentle days when his mother had lifted him in her arms and allowed him to choose a fruit, tickling him as the sweet, tangy pink grapefruit juice ran down his chin. Tonight he could see that the tree was one of the few things in the backyard that hadn’t died, though it was well past time to trim it back, and fruits in varying stages of decomposition littered the ground beneath it.

  Josh turned again toward the back door, and as he did so, something assaulted his senses, threatening to drive him even further into his past. It wasn’t the tree, or the yard. Instead, it was a smell that wafted through the open kitchen window, a rich aroma that set his stomach rumbling.

  Somewhere, just beyond the door he so feared to open, was a home-cooked dinner.

  Alert and anxious, Josh entered the kitchen and his eyes confirmed what his nose suspected. The small Formica table was set for two, and steaming dishes of mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables sat beside a freshly roasted chicken, still on the bone and ready for carving.

  Without thought, Josh dropped his backpack and jammed his finger into the potatoes for a taste, but before he could bring that finger to his lips, a shrill “Joshua, what do you think you’re doing?” met his ears, and he instinctively pulled both his hands behind his back and turned to face Polly, who was busy removing a tray of freshly baked dinner rolls from the oven.

  “I—I’m sorry,” he stammered.

  “Sorry doesn’t cream the corn,” Polly replied sharply. “You will wash your filthy hands and face and put those foul-smelling clothes in the laundry room before you enjoy so much as a crumb from this table. Do you understand?” she finished.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Josh replied automatically, before adding apologetically, “everything smells great.”

  “Of course it does, dear.” Polly smiled warmly. “Now move!”

  Josh found himself hurrying to do her bidding, unable to believe his good fortune. Hector might have been his first choice in a protector, but he doubted the mammoth demon would have known his way around a kitchen, or a vacuum cleaner, he mentally added, realizing as he made his way down the hall that the house was the cleanest it had been in over a year. His room smelled of fresh pine and lemon. The starched and ironed pillowcases atop his perfectly made bed and the ordered arrangement of his books and soccer trophies on his desk all testified to the fact that Polly had made herself more than useful during the day. He rejoiced inwardly at the knowledge that when he presented himself at her table—funny how the entire house now seems to belong to her—he would do so with something to offer her by way of thanks.

  It hadn’t been easy. In fact, it had been terrifying, but that very afternoon at school Josh had managed to accomplish the only thing Polly had asked of him in return for her protection.

  Josh had stolen Principal Snyder’s shoe.

  He would never have been able to manage it without specific instructions from Polly the night before as to how exactly he might accomplish this minor miracle. It had depended upon two things. The first was the existence of a small faculty bathroom just down the hall from the principal’s office that Snyder had immediately designated for his exclusive use once he had joined the administration of Sunnydale High. Though few faculty members seemed to genuinely like the principal, ever fewer seemed willing to risk his displeasure on any given day, so the rest of the faculty had given up this small privilege without too many complaints. The second was an odd personal habit of Snyder’s. Apparently, whenever the principal retired to his private domain and entered the bathroom’s only stall, he removed his shoes and placed them on the floor in front of him before he sat down. This, Polly had assured him, he had done ever since he was a little boy.

  Josh’s heart had been in his throat as he had silently entered the bathroom that afternoon, a good forty-five minutes before the bell was to ring. But just as Polly had said, he had seen Principal Snyder’s polished black dress shoes poking out from the stall door, and he was out of the bathroom, shoe in bag, and well down the hall before he had heard the first shriek of alarm from the principal echoing behind him.

  Now that the deed had been accomplished, and fortified by the prospect of the most delicious meal he’d had in a year as a reward, Josh re-entered the kitchen a few minutes later with a spring in his step and the slightly ripe dress shoe in his hand.

  Polly turned immediately to face him upon his return, and he reveled at the glimmer of satisfaction in her eyes as he approached her, holding the shoe before him like a holy relic.

  “Oh, my dear, dear boy,” Polly cooed warmly. “Well done.”

  “You’re welcome,” Josh replied as she quickly plucked the shoe from his hands and clutched it to her heart, regarding it with almost the same affection a mother would have for a newborn child.

  “Do sit down and eat something,” Polly said absently, still cradling the shoe.

  “Thank you, ma’am,” Josh answered, and immediately sat and began to pile his plate with as much fresh food as it would hold.

  The first bite of potatoes had barely touched his tongue when a wave of nausea tightened his gut. As Polly took her place beside him, setting the shoe in her lap, she seemed to notice his attempt to force down the food.

  “Is everything all right, dear?” she asked with genuine concern.

  “Oh, yes,” Josh replied as best he could, though he hesitated to fill another forkful.

  The potatoes tasted so foul, he could barely swallow them. He didn’t know if they had been rank before she had cooked them, or if she had mashed them with sour milk. In any event, they were inedible. He turned his attention to the chicken, hoping for something better. Though his appetite had gone with the first of the potatoes, in his limited experience there was little harm that could be done to a freshly roasted chicken.

  Like the potatoes, however, the first bite of chicken was also to be his last.

  “Eat up, dear,” Polly was saying as she filled her own plate. “You’re a growing boy, and you need your nutrition.”

  The meat assaulted his taste buds with a riot of decay and rot that he could only associate with a cat that had once died in his backyard. It had been found several days too late to do anything about the smell but wait it out.

  “Is there a problem, dear?” Polly asked sweetly as Josh instinctively spat the chicken back onto his plate and drop
ped his fork.

  “No, ma’am,” Josh replied feebly. “I guess I’m just not as hungry as I thought.”

  “I spent the entire afternoon preparing this meal, Joshua,” Polly began sternly, “and you will finish every bite of it before you leave this table.”

  Josh looked at the plate, then at Polly, and took a moment to evaluate where the greater threat lay.

  Unfortunately, he chose wrong.

  “I have a history paper to write,” he said as he began to rise from the table.

  “What did you say, young man?” Polly asked, standing as well and suddenly taking on a more menacing appearance than he would ever have thought possible in floral cotton and lace.

  “I—I…,” Josh started to stammer.

  “Boys.”

  Polly spat the word as if it tasted as bad to her as the chicken had tasted to Josh.

  “Just like my Cecil,” she began. “You’re all the same: ungrateful and selfish. You don’t understand a mother’s love, and you have no respect for the time and energy it takes to care for pathetic little wretches like you,” Polly continued.

  Josh stepped back from the table and found his back against the kitchen wall. His hand started to move of its own accord down the length of the wall until it found the knob to the basement door. As Polly continued her rant, flecks of spittle flying from her lips along with insults, Josh threw open the door and, as quickly as he could, rushed down the basement steps.

  Polly followed him to the doorway, the pitch of her voice rising until her words became unintelligible shrieks, and Josh quickly realized he had all but cornered himself. As he searched for a defensible position, he noted for the first time in the shadows cast by the basement’s single overhanging bulb a hand reaching out to him from the far corner, nearest what had been his father’s workbench.

  “Dad?” Josh whispered.

  As Polly began to descend the steps, Joshua reached for the hand only to find that it was ice cold to his touch, and much lighter than it should have been. This made immediate sense when he tugged on the hand, only to find that while it was still connected to his father’s forearm, the rest of his father was no longer attached to it.

  “What did you do?” Joshua screamed, turning on Polly, who now stood, arms crossed, at the base of the stairs.

  “I did what you asked,” Polly replied evenly. “Your father will never hurt you again.”

  “I … I …” But Josh couldn’t finish the thought. Much as he had hated his father, much as his father had made his life a living hell over the past year, Josh was completely unprepared for his dismemberment. Josh no longer knew what exactly he had wanted when he had summoned Polly. All he knew for sure was that he hadn’t wanted this.

  Mustering all the courage that remained in him, Josh turned to Polly and shouted, “And I stole that shoe for you! We’re even. Now get out!”

  Polly seemed to have collected herself. She only smiled slightly at his words.

  “I will, dear,” she said simply, “just as soon as I’ve finished cleaning up this mess.”

  “What mess?” Josh asked. “This house has never been so clean.”

  “The mess you make by your presence, my boy,” Polly replied.

  The next thing Josh knew, the hand that still held his father’s cold, dead arm felt as if it were on fire. It was almost a pleasant release as the fire subsided, despite the fact that his hand had been pulled from its place on his arm and fell to the floor, alongside his father’s arm, with a splat.

  The rest of his joints were tingling and beginning to burn when Josh realized just how big a mistake he had made. The last thought he had before the darkness took him was simply, I’m so sorry, but he died long before he knew for whom exactly that apology had been meant.

  Buffy entered the library Tuesday morning before the start of classes to find Giles standing over Xander, who was seated at the central research table intently studying what appeared to be an ancient manuscript of some kind. Cordelia stood by, anxiously tapping her foot in a manner that suggested in no uncertain terms she would rather be anywhere but there.

  “So is there any way to reach this dimension?” Xander asked seriously.

  “It would be most unwise,” was Giles’s characteristic response.

  “But if that’s where all my extra socks are—oh, hey, Buffy.” Xander interrupted himself, his eyes brightening at the sight of the Slayer.

  “Geez, Xander,” Cordelia interjected wearily, “if the sock demons—”

  “Gnomes,” Giles couldn’t help but correct her.

  “Whatever,” Cordelia continued. “If these guys love your socks so much, I say let it go. That’s why somebody out there created Target.”

  “We’re talking about a crime against humanity,” Xander argued back. “To take one sock at a time, leaving a man with dozens of mismatched pairs—that’s just evil.”

  “Do I need to be here for this?” Buffy asked, stifling a yawn.

  Giles busied himself rebinding the manuscript as he answered, “Not at all. Xander was just curious about this rather common phenomenon of seeming to misplace one sock each time one does a load of laundry, and I was attempting to explain—”

  “Yeah, we got it,” Cordelia interrupted, checking her watch. “Xander has angered the sock gods. Can we go now?”

  “Gnomes,” Giles added weakly.

  “You could show a little compassion,” Xander rebuked her. “We don’t all have access to your daddy’s credit cards, you know.”

  The very thought of her purchasing power brought a faint smile to Cordelia’s lips.

  “How was your patrol last night, Buffy?” Giles asked in an obvious effort to change the subject.

  “I think he’s trying to kill me,” she replied, settling for a moment in an open chair and again placing her hand over her mouth to cover a larger yawn.

  “Who?” Giles asked, instantly alert. “A demon? A vampire?”

  “Angel?” Cordelia added. “’Cause we all knew that.”

  “My tutor,” Buffy replied pointedly. Though she had always known it would be inappropriate to use her powers as the Slayer to harm a human being, there were days—and this was one of them—when she honestly wondered if Cordelia really met that requirement.

  “Ah, I see,” Giles said thoughtfully. “Terribly demanding, is he?”

  “Did you know that King George the Third of England, the guy who was supposedly running your country during the American Revolution, was actually insane?” Buffy asked.

  “In fact, I did,” Giles replied.

  “Or that by the time World War One broke out, most of the monarchs of the various countries that went to war were actually related to one another?”

  “Yes, I’m sure I read that somewhere too,” Giles continued evenly.

  “Well, now I do too,” Buffy replied, “along with about fifty other useless facts that I’m going to need to discuss on my world history final, and will be quizzed on tonight, right after I finish my practice essay on the use of metaphor in ‘Ode on a Grecian Vase.’”

  “Urn,” Giles corrected her.

  “I thought it was a vase,” Buffy said.

  “It is, it—never mind. While I’m pleased to see that you’re making progress in your studies, I must caution you that this is no time to neglect your slaying duties.”

  “Like there’s any way I don’t know that?” Buffy said sharply. Before Giles could retort, she added more gently, “I’m sorry. I’m just really tired. I didn’t sleep very well last night, and until finals are done, I have my regular homework, plus lots and lots of extra homework.”

  “Can’t Willow be of some assistance?” Giles asked.

  “Unless Willow can somehow take my finals and hers at the same time, I’d say no,” Buffy replied, then added, “I promise I’ll patrol tonight, right after my study session.”

  “And after that, you should join us at the Bronze,” Xander suggested. “Dingoes are playing tonight. Should be happening.”

/>   “Yes, well, whatever your plans, do make sure—,” Giles began.

  “I will. Chosen One. Destiny. Got it,” Buffy cut him off, collecting her books and joining Xander and Cordelia as they made their way to the doors. “Why do they say there’s no rest for the wicked? Boy, did they get that one wrong.”

  She didn’t need to turn around to know that Giles was looking after her, both concerned and resigned. The truth was, he knew that being the Slayer and a high school junior was no picnic, but there was little he could do at such times to ease her burdens.

  As Buffy, Xander, and Cordelia merged into the early morning hallway traffic, Xander picked up on his earlier theme.

  “So how about it, Buffy? Up for a little fun tonight?”

  “I don’t think so, Xander,” she replied. “I really have to hit the books tonight. Come to think of it, if hitting them was all I had to do—”

  “What’s up with him?” Cordelia interrupted.

  Buffy and Xander followed her gaze and found she was watching Principal Snyder walk serenely past them, seemingly oblivious to the students around him and the many opportunities for detentions in his wake.

  “He looks almost …”

  “Happy?” Xander finished for Cordelia.

  “He probably just saw my score on that chemistry quiz yesterday,” Buffy said sadly.

  “Oh, what’s the big deal,” Cordelia said frankly, obviously trying to raise Buffy’s spirits in her own special way. “I mean, it’s not like you’re ever going to need chemistry.”

  “I will if I want to graduate,” Buffy replied.

  “Assuming you live that long,” Cordelia added.

  “Cordelia—,” Buffy began.

  “That’s my girl,” Xander said firmly, placing himself between Cordelia and the Slayer, “always trying to find the silver lining.”

  “I’m just saying … ,” Cordelia trailed off as he grasped her by the elbow and steered her away from Buffy’s frowning face.