FIC: Almost A Whisper (1/2)

["hd_genscher" <HD.Genscher@xxxxxx>]

TITLE: Almost A Whisper (1/2)
AUTHOR: HD_Genscher (hd.genscher@xxxxxx)
RATING: PG
PAIRING: B/W
SPOILERS: 3rd season
DISCLAIMER: All characters and places belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant
Enemy, et al.
ARCHIVE: Sure. Just let me know.
FEEDBACK: Please. 
DEDICATED TO: Kris. Thanks a lot!
SUMMARY: It's Buffy's 18th birthday and someone makes sure she'll
never forget it.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is the prequel to my story "Forever" and the
sequel to "Letter To Your Heart". It takes place in the 3rd season,
instead of "Helpless". There'll be no Cruciamentum in this Buffyverse.



OUTSIDE

During the day, Sunnydale was a town not unlike many others at the
west coast. It had some more cemeteries than other towns, and its
amount of unsolved cases of death was ten times higher than the state
average.
But beyond that, life was quite normal. The people had learned to
forget the many strange things they had heard or seen. They had
learned to suppress the memories of the many friends, relatives and
neighbors that had disappeared or died. 
They had learned to seize the moment. And so people went out, people
fell in love with each other, people married and had children. As long
as the sun was up, as long as you didn't do something stupid when it
wasn't, life was beautiful, even on the Hellmouth.

But once night fell, all that changed. The outskirt streets where
happy children had been playing were deserted. Many shopkeepers closed
their shops on Main Street after seven -- there would be no customers
anyway. 
Some people had learned that going out in groups was better than
walking alone. And when going to the movies, you just had to avoid
certain "dangerous" areas and short cuts. Even the most oblivious of
Sunnydale's inhabitants knew that it was good to go home as fast as
possible when the sun had set. 

Finally, when the last belated homecomer was in the safe harbor of his
or her house, silence fell over Sunnydale. And then something else
came creeping out of dark corners, derelict buildings and the sewers. 
Now it was their turn, and the darkness belonged to them as they
belonged to the darkness.

And with them came the fear.

**

The petite blonde girl patrolling through one of Sunnydale's many
cemeteries wasn't showing any signs of fear. She was walking
determinedly between tombstones and mausoleums.

That didn't mean that she wasn't afraid from time to time. She had
seen too many things, knew about the countless horrors the Hellmouth
was able to produce too well not to be.
She had learned that a certain degree of fear was quite
life-prolonging, to use it as an instrument. Fear kept her from taking
things too easy, from laxity in the job. And that job was to be out
when everyone else was sleeping, to dam up the forces of darkness,
though she would never stop the flow of evil that was constantly
coming from the Hellmouth. 

A lack of fear had cost the lives of some of her predecessors who had
fought the same battle. 
At the same time, she had to prevent the fear from overcoming her,
from paralyzing her. It was an eternal struggle within her, like the
battle of good versus evil that was fought out night by night around
her.

"When you're outside tonight, you've got to know I'll be there for
you," she hummed to herself.

Suddenly, she stopped, intensely listening to one side. A small smile
appeared around her mouth. Then, with a giant leap, she stood behind
the creature of the night that had been lurking behind some shrubs.

"Hi, looking for something particular?" the blonde asked with an
innocent voice that resounded over the silent graveyard.

Although the vampire was surprised, his fright didn't remain long. He
turned around and attempted to hit her with his forearm. She had
expected that and easily ducked away, then responded with a kick to
the stomach of her adversary. The vampire stumbled backwards, fighting
for balance while holding his belly where she had hit him.
He growled, but the pain seemed to goad him on. They exchanged some
hard blows, each blocked by the other, until the Slayer decided it was
time to finish.
With a precise punch to the chin, she sent the vamp down to the
ground. Her wooden stake whirled and hit its target with deadly
accuracy. A cloud of dust raised, and the fight was over as fast as it
had begun. Silence fell again.

Putting the stake back into her pocket, the girl suddenly felt the
untypical coldness that was coming from the sea. She pulled her jacket
more tightly around her, then decided to call it a night and go home.

Tomorrow, the sun would come up again. It would set an end to the
darkness and what was lurking in its cover, at least for twelve hours.

When the night fell again, duty would call. But in the meantime, she
would enjoy the day.

Because tomorrow was a special day. Her father would come from L.A.
and they would go to the ice show.

On the calendar hanging from a wall in the kitchen of her home, the
reason was written in her mom's handwriting next to tomorrow's date:
Buffy's Birthday.

**

Joyce Summers was in said kitchen, preparing dinner. Her daughter
would be home from her nightly patrol soon and they would be eating
together.
Although she knew for a couple of months now what Buffy was doing out
there in the night and how important it was, she still hadn't become
accustomed to it completely. It just felt... wrong... that her little
girl was the 'only girl in all the world to fight the forces of
darkness.' At least that was more or less how her daughter's watcher
had explained her calling.

She heard something from the entrance.

"Buffy?" she asked.

"Present," Buffy answered, entering the kitchen. Her look fell on the
large bunch of flowers and she smiled. "Ooo, present!" she exclaimed.

"Uh, they're not. They're from your father." 

Buffy inspected the floral arrangement more closely. It was nice, but
why would he send her this if they were going to the ice show together
tomorrow?
Then she discovered the attached tickets and her smile faded. She
picked the card and the tickets from the arrangement and looked at
them.

"His, uh, quarterly projections are unraveling and he can't afford to
take off right now," Joyce explained. "He promises to make it up to
you. It's all right there in the letter," she continued, pointing to
the card.

Buffy sadly folded up the tickets and the card without even opening
it.

"I-if you want, I could ask somebody to cover for me at the gallery,"
Joyce offered, seeing the disappointed expression on her daughter's
face.
"No. No, that's not necessary," Buffy rejected and walked towards the
stairs.

"Don't you want some dinner, honey?" Joyce asked.

"Sorry, mom. I'm not hungry and just want to be alone, okay?" 

Buffy stormed upstairs and her mother heard the door slam shut. 

"Okay..." Joyce sighed, then sat down and started to eat. 



SOLILOQUY

Buffy let herself fall onto her bed. She stared at the ceiling
disappointedly.

It just wasn't fair. Going to the ice show was one of the rare
opportunities to do something with her father. Since her parents were
divorced, she usually saw him only once or twice a year, so she was
really looking forward to those father-daughter activities.
And now he didn't have time for her. He didn't have time for his
daughter's birthday! How dare he...

So in his eyes, she wasn't Daddy's little girl anymore, but a young
woman who'd be able to cope with the fact that her father didn't have
time for her birthday, but had to care for his business.

'Or maybe he's just making out with his secretary,' Buffy thought
bitterly.

She felt the lump in her throat.

She decided that she was in need of some comfort and intuitively
picked the stuffed pig from the shelf next to her bed. His name was
Mr. Gordo and he had been hers for ages, so it probably had been her
first stuffed animal. She gave him a tight hug, then placed him on her
belly and slowly stroked his short pink fur, as if he was the one in
need of comfort.

Her father wouldn't come. And she didn't want her mother to go with
her, as a substitute for her ex-husband's duty. Maybe she could ask
Willow...

Buffy thoughts wandered to her red-haired friend.

She had been so happy that their friendship had still been intact
after her stupid flight to L.A.

After all they had been through together, after all they had done for
each other, putting their lives in danger for each other, she somehow
hadn't expected anything else, but you never knew. 

There was one thing Buffy knew for sure: she had put that friendship
to a hard test when she had left town after killing Angel. She knew
now that it had been a mistake to give in to her selfish need to
escape from the reality that was her life. Finally, she had realized
that there was no escape, that her place was here as was her duty. And
the one that had her heart. Her soulmate. The one her world revolved
around.

Willow.

It had been during her self chosen exile in L.A. that she had realized
her true feelings for the hacker. With the help of some letters she
had written to her best friend that she'd never actually sent, she had
learned to express her long buried feelings for Willow for the first
time.

It had helped her to see the reason why she had to continue fighting
the good fight.

She had come back to Sunnydale. Back to her friends, her duties as the
Slayer. And back to Willow.

It had been tougher than she had thought.

During what she called 'Dead Man's Party' -- thanks to a possessed
artifact from the gallery that her mother had placed in their house --
she even had been tempted to give up and run away again. She couldn't
bear the pain in the eyes of her friends who didn't understand, who
couldn't understand, because she didn't talk to them, and ran away
instead.

But the worst of all had been the pain in Willow's eyes. And when she
had caught Buffy blindly stuffing clothes into a bag to escape from
her friends' pain, from her pain, they even had had a fight, their
first real fight. 

Willow had accused her of running away from her problems instead of
facing them, and of leaving her friends behind during that process,
worrying day and night about her fate instead of letting them -- and
especially Willow, her best friend -- help by at least talking to her.

Then, the living dead had attacked her house and jointly, they had
defeated them. That had brought the fire back and also their old team
spirit.

Xander, Giles, and even her mother had tacitly accepted afterwards
that there were reasons she couldn't talk about for her running away.
She was back, after all, and she accepted that she had been wrong.
That was it.

The rebonding of the Slayer and the Hacker had needed some more time,
but it finally occurred at one of their favorite places, Sunnydale's
Italian café, known as the Espresso Pump. They had talked like two
friends, no, like best friends again.

And yet, she hadn't had the guts to tell Willow everything, about how
she felt... about how she felt about her...

...although there was nothing in the way, now that Angel was dead.

Giles had proposed a way to bring him back in the weeks after she had
resumed her duties -- a mere theoretical possibility, though, that
just didn't work out. She still suspected her watcher had just brought
it up because he believed the thought of a chance to rescue the
vampire would comfort her, would ease the pain he thought she was
still feeling about his death.

But she was over Angel by then. She still remembered what they had,
and that it had been something unique, something special. But she also
couldn't forget what Angel was, what he could have become any time
again if she hadn't sent him to hell.

And she had found out that she was in love with her best friend...

...who wasn't that close to Oz anymore. Somehow, during the last
months, or more precisely since she had returned, their closeness had
diminished. Maybe Oz's wolfy nature was the cause, or maybe Willow
didn't love Oz because she loved...
Buffy discarded that thought right away. This was her wishful thinking
and not the facts.

There was nothing in the way, except her fears of losing Willow.

That was why she couldn't ask the redhead. It was too much like a date
in her eyes. And that would endanger their friendship, because Buffy
was quite sure that her friend had nothing more than just... well,
friendly feelings for her.

"You don't know what's going on, do you?" she asked Mr. Gordo. "It's
so simple to tell... you at least... and yet everything's so
complicated..."

Her eyes filled with tears. And the reason for that was simple.

Buffy was afraid.

Afraid of being in love with her best friend. Afraid of losing her.
Afraid of the future. 

'Oh, Willow!' she sighed, while the first tear rolled down her cheek.

She let it all out. There was no sense in holding back the tears, to
be slowly eaten from inside by her fears. She sobbed and weeped, all
the while hugging her stuffed companion, slowly wetting a part of his
fur with her salty tears.

If the vampires could see her now, the mighty Vampire Slayer, what
would they see? They would see that she was just a girl, after all.
Beyond her calling, her mission and her supernatural powers, she was
still human, with her own problems and desires that had nothing to do
with the Hellmouth or anything like that.

Finally, the tears subsided. She lay there on her side, all curled up,
her arm still around the stuffed pig. Then she fell into a deep and
dreamless sleep.



BIRTHDAY

Buffy woke up, sleepy first, then suddenly very awake. It was her
birthday!

She stretched, yawned, and finally got up to take a look out the
window. She couldn't believe her eyes: the world outside was white.
Buffy remembered the unusually cold breeze she had felt last night,
but this was unbelievable. A thick layer of snow, at least four inches
thick, was covering the streets and paths, bushes and trees. All the
houses in the neighborhood were wearing white hats now, reflecting the
bright winter sun.

She quickly dressed, then stormed downstairs. "Mom? Do you see
*that*?" she shouted excitedly.

Joyce was sitting at the table in the dining room, reading the paper,
a mug of coffee in front of her. "Good morning, honey."

Buffy gave her mother a quick kiss on the cheek. "Morning, Mom!" she
replied.

"And yes, I've seen it. I couldn't believe my eyes, either," Joyce
continued.

Buffy went over to the kitchen and took a bowl and the cereal pack out
of a cabinet.

"Are there any historic references for something like this?" she
asked.

"I don't think so. In the news, they said it's the coldest day in over
a century. But it didn't snow back then. Traffic has come to a
standstill everywhere and authorities are trying to clear the streets
as fast as possible, but I think they said they'll need at least a
day, so all public institutions will remain closed today."

"Yay! No school on my birthday. Now that's good news," Buffy said
while pouring some milk into her bowl of cereal.

"By the way... Happy Birthday, Buffy," Joyce said as Buffy came back
into the dining room with her breakfast.

Her mother was holding something in her hand now. It was something
large, wrapped in white paper. 
Buffy carefully put her bowl down onto the table, then took the
present out of her Joyce's hands and unwrapped it with a quick,
impatient motion.

It was a wooden longbow, about 70 inches long.

"Oh, Mom! It's... wonderful!"

Buffy had worked with crossbows a lot, but this was something
completely different. She followed the bow's curvature with her hand.
It was made of one single piece of wood -- yew, she assumed. The bow
was perfect, lying so well in her hand as if it had been made for her.

"Mr. Giles was so kind as to advise me on what to buy," Joyce told
her.

Buffy picked up one of the wooden arrows and drew the bow, testing its
tension. Satisfied with the result, she put it back down, much to
Joyce's relief.

"But wasn't it very expensive?" Buffy asked with a touch of guilty
conscience.

"Buffy, you'll have your 18th birthday only once. And don't worry, the
gallery's been running well lately. I think I can afford to buy you a
birthday present."

"Thank you, Mom." Buffy gave her mother another hug.

"What do you think about going for a walk?" Joyce proposed, pointing
out the window.

"That would be nice." Buffy smiled at her mother thankfully. She
yearned to try out her longbow, but that would have to wait.

After Buffy had changed into a thick red sweater she'd found somewhere
in the depth of her wardrobe, she completed her outfit with a white
scarf.

Joyce appeared at the door of her room. She had adjusted her attire as
well, reflecting the fact that -- despite the sun shining brightly --
it was quite cold outside, especially considering California's usual
temperatures.

"Do you think you can show yourself with your Mom?" she asked.

Buffy grinned. "Oh yeah."

They went downstairs and left the house. 

"Any particular destination?" Buffy asked.

"No."

"Then let's go this way." Buffy took charge and chose a direction that
would not lead them to any of the graveyards that could possibly be
the source of trouble, even if it was daytime.

They slowly walked along, all the while chatting, admiring the
wondrous transformation of their home town that had turned it into a
completely different place overnight. 

At the same time, they slowly adjusted to the strange feeling under
their shoes. Now Buffy was glad that her mother had insisted on buying
a pair of robust, closed shoes last fall. Those weren't fashionable,
as she had repeatedly remarked back then, but as it turned out now,
they were comfortable and useful when the weather didn't permit normal
footwear.

They freely talked about everything that came to their minds, for the
first time in months, starting with... shoes. Joyce felt she had to
show her daughter that she was always there for her, after Buffy had
been so disappointed with her father's cancellation.

Running the gallery soon had turned out to be a full-time job. When
she wasn't in the gallery, she was either doing all antique shops in
California (or almost all of them) to find new objects or doing the
paperwork. Maybe that had led to her ignoring the many, many signs
that her daughter's life was anything but an ordinary one. Finally,
that had caused Buffy's running away six months ago, Joyce believed.

But Buffy assured her that she didn't feel neglected, that she was
feeling well at home and that she wouldn't run away again. When it
came to boys, Buffy even freely admitted that she was over Angel now.

They were so absorbed in their conversation that they didn't notice
the small paper pinned to a tree, and passed by it.

Whenever Joyce came up with something concerning her friends -- or
Willow in particular, however, Buffy quickly switched to another
topic, hoping that her mother didn't notice that she was avoiding that
topic.

And Buffy was glad that Joyce didn't talk about her calling. She
vividly remembered what had happened the last time her mother had
shown interest in slaying, although she and the others had been under
demonic influence back then.

Suddenly Buffy faltered mid-sentence. She had discovered something at
a tree they were approaching. Joyce followed her eyes.

There was a note pinned to it, and someone had written a large 'B'
with a red felt tip on it. 'Faith?' Buffy wondered. She was the only
one calling her 'B', after all. She pulled it off and unfolded it. 

"Buffy,
go to where the books live," she read out loud.

"Strange," she then muttered to herself.

"Everything's okay?" Joyce asked.

"Yeah... but how could anyone expect us to walk by here?" Buffy asked,
slightly worried. 

Joyce shrugged. "Maybe it's not for you?"

"How many Buffy's do you know?" her daughter countered.

"True," Joyce admitted.

"I think I should check out the school library," Buffy continued.

The note told her to go to the library, she thought, and there could
be a demonic force behind all this. If so, Giles would probably know.
"Maybe Giles knows what this is all about," she concluded.

"Honey, don't you think he'll be at home rather than in the library?"
Joyce was skeptical.

"You know Giles, he's *living* in that library. Even if there's no
school today," Buffy pointed out. "So I think I'd better hurry. If...
you don't mind?" she added on second thought.

Joyce knew that, above all things, her daughter was determined to
fulfill her duties. And if that meant to check out places due to vague
hints, well, so be it.

"It's okay," she assured.

"Thanks, Mom!" Buffy replied, and took off immediately.

"But try to be back for dinner," Joyce called after her daughter
teasingly.

"I'll try," was the answer.


TBC...