ff: Past Imperfect Chapter eight/?

["Christeen Demons" <Shyfox30@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

How about a chapter of Past Imperfect for good measure.

Disclaimer in previous parts.

Chapter eight

"Hey Cassandra! Wait up!" Buffy called out to her friend, who seemed to be 
making a mad dash through the halls in order to avoid having to talk to her. 
She'd been doing this all morning and it was starting to wear on her 
nerves.

Cassandra glanced back, and for a brief moment Buffy thought she was going 
to stop, but then a look of fear crept over her face, and Buffy was 
surprised that she could tell what kind of look it was from this distance, 
before she picked up her speed. Buffy could have sworn she heard Cassandra 
saying, 'Sorry Buffy, gotta get to class. I'm late.' Right before she 
disappeared, but again, that should have been impossible from this distance.

"Hey, What's her problem? It's like she doesn't want to hang out with us or 
something?" Nicole asked, a little put out by the mad dash through the 
halls that Buffy had just put them through, just to try to catch up to the 
geekette.

"Yeah, and like...why do we care?" Kimberly asked, feeling put out herself 
with the way Buffy and Cassandra had been acting with each other all 
morning. There was like, something weird going on between the two, and she 
was dying to figure out what it was.

"Because she gets me a B in history, all right?" Buffy said, snappishly to 
her oldest, yet least trusted friend, before turning to answer Nicole's 
question. "And that's what I'm trying to find out. I think she had a fight 
with her parent's last night or something." She winced as the lie slipped 
easily out of her mouth, but it seemed to be accepted, with a certain amount 
of glee by the others, who just loved a good, juicy bit of gossip.

"Oooh, really?" Jenny squeeled, her eyes lighting up with undisguised 
delight, and Buffy immediately felt sick to her stomach for giving them any 
ammunition. And, also, she didn't know what she would do if Cassandra told 
them the truth.

"Yeah. Come on guys. Let's just get to class." Buffy said, tucking her 
hands in her jeans pockets and heading off in the other direction.

*****

Buffy sat at her desk, chewing pensively on her pencil, while trying to act 
like she was interested in what the teacher was saying. Kim and Jen were in 
back of her, passing notes to each other and giggling, and she couldn't help 
wondering if they were gossiping about her. Okay, so she was definitely 
feeling paranoid, but in her book she had every right to be. I mean, it's 
not every day that you find you're this Super hero...Vampire Slayer...Chosen 
One. And it wasn't like she even
had a secret identity that she could hide under, either. Nope. She was 
just Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. And now Cassandra was avoiding her. She 
had feared this would happen, but to actually have it come true was totally 
unnerving. She knew what would happen if her other friends found out, she 
would be alienated and shunned. Her popularity would plummet, and she would 
become a leper in this school.

That was why she had to tell them she couldn't do it. Better yet, just 
avoid the whole thing. Maybe if she just didn't show up he'd go away, find 
somebody else to do it. I mean, it wasn't as if he thought she was really 
cut out for it anyway. Nope, it would be better for everybody if she just 
avoided the whole thing. Besides, she really had to find Cassandra and talk 
to her. Damage control was a Bitch, but somebody had to do it.

*****
Merrick paced through the big room, walking back and forth in front of the 
big Grandfather clock, which he kept glancing at, before huffing out yet 
another sigh. Finally he stopped, placing his fists on his hips and glaring 
at Willow, as if Buffy's not showing up was somehow her fault. "It's after 
Three. I distinctly told her to meet me here after school. Where is she?"

Willow rolled her eyes, looking away from Merrick's intent face. When he 
cleared his throat, definitely expecting an answer, she looked back at him, 
releasing a huge sigh of her own. "Well you really didn't just expect her 
to come, did you?"

"Well, I..." Merrick started, consternated. But Willow was by no means 
finished.

"I mean, you say come, so she comes?" She said sarcastically, wishing that 
for just once Merrick would listen to her greater wisdom where Buffy was 
concerned. "Buffy's not like that. I mean, she doesn't just come at the 
snap of a finger. " She snapped, just to prove her point.

"Well...I..."

"If there's anything I know about Buffy, it's that she can be very stubborn 
when she puts her mind to it." Boy could she. Willow thought, a small 
smile playing over her mouth as she remembered some of their more memorable 
arguments. Buffy had been just as stubborn then.

"Well, I..." Merrick started again, wishing the girl would at least let him 
get a word in, but apparently Willow still wasn't finished.

"And after what happened last night, can you really blame her for not 
showing up. She's going to want to distance herself from this whole thing." 
Willow finished, her face glowing pink from the mad on Merrick had allowed 
to flourish full form.

"Well...do you have any idea where she might be?" Merrick asked, his tone 
low as if he didn't dare offend her further, afraid she'd run into another 
spiel.

"Well...she did say she had cheerleading practice today. My guess 
is...she's there." Willow said, rolling her eyes again, as if that should 
have been obvious to him from the beginning.

Merrick rolled his eyes this time, wondering why it was that he always had 
to work with teenagers. "Come on." He said, grabbing his coat and hat. 
"We have a recalcitrant Slayer to get."

Willow wisely didn't offer up another word.

*****

"So...you planning on avoiding me all week, or just today?" Buffy asked, 
her tone light, but when Cassandra looked up from the computer program she 
had been losing herself in, feeling like a deer caught in headlights, she 
could see the anger flashing in the bright blue eyes.

"Ummm...Buffy." Cassandra stuttered, looking around nervously to make sure 
nobody could over hear. "I wasn't avoiding you, I was just late for class."

Buffy nodded slowly. "Yup. All day...even during lunch. Must have been 
some class you had to make you miss lunch."

"Buffy...I...didn't get a lot of sleep last night. I had this really 
bad...dream. Maybe that's why I've been off all day." Cassandra was scared 
now, Buffy looked really pissed, and if she wanted to, she could make her 
life a living hell at Hemry. All of the popular kids listened to her, 
followed her around like she was a God or something. Well, after last 
night, she was starting to think that maybe she was.

"Look...I can't promise that you won't have more...bad dreams. God knows 
I've been having my own...bad dreams...lately. But maybe...you know...if 
you don't hide we can face our...bad dreams...together." She didn't quite 
know what she was promising, only that Cassandra was the
only friend that she had that didn't out right judge her on first sight, and 
maybe...would be able to understand the whole Vampire thing.

"You won't tell anybody about my...bad dreams?" Cassandra asked, looking 
around nervously once more.

"Not if you don't tell anybody about mine." Buffy said, both a promise and 
a threat.

"Okay." Cassandra said, allowing herself to smile for the first time that 
day.

"Great." Buffy grinned in relief, before she happened to look at the clock 
on the wall. "Oh great. I'm gonna be late for practice. Catch ya later."

*****

"Oh. Hi."

"Wow. You're late." Nicole greeted her as she raced into the locker room.

"I'm going to practice." Buffy said, sounding a little annoyed, not to 
mention out of breath. Considering she had run to the Gym all the way from 
Cassandra's computer class, she was a little of both.

"Cool. See you out there." Nicole said, dashing out the door.

"Okay. Bye." Buffy said, as she opened up her locker and started getting 
changed for practice. A clearing of a throat caused her to turn, and she 
gasped as she saw Merrick and Willow standing there. "Oh god, what are you 
doing here? This a naked place." She protested their appearance, throwing 
the locker door in front of her as if she were trying to hide her assets, 
while she took in their appearance.

Merrick looked slightly disgruntled, while Willow....actually, she couldn't 
quite make out the look on Willow's face. She kind of looked like she was 
in daze and she couldn't help blushing self-consciously.

"You were supposed to meet me an hour ago." Merrick said, disapproval deep 
in his voice.

"I told you that I have practice." Buffy said, stubbornly, still thrown by 
their sudden appearance.

"And I told you to skip it." Merrick replied back, just as stubborn in his 
insistance that the girl listen to him.

Buffy took a deep breath, then looked him square in the eyes. "Listen, I 
think there's been a big mistake, all right. I mean I appreciate that there 
are real vampires, and that you're on this big holy mission, but obviously 
somebody read their tea leaves wrong, because I'm not your girl. And I don't 
think I'm up to it. And just between you and me...neither do you." She 
layed it all on the line for them, letting them see all of her doubts.

"It is true." Merrick said, slowly, causing Willow to glance at him in 
surprise. "You have missed years of training."

"See." Buffy gloated, feeling slightly justified.

"And you are undisciplined...frivolous..."

"Don't I know it." Buffy said, emphatically, glad that he was seeing the 
light in this whole dumb, Chosen One thing. Willow tried very hard not to 
be offended by the things Merrick was saying about Buffy, after all, they 
were very true about this Buffy and she probably needed to hear it be said, 
she tried not to take it to heart.

"Quite probably the most vacuous choice in my entire..."

"Okay. Okay. I think we both get the point." Buffy said, getting 
defensive now that he kept harping on her lesser qualities.

"Right. Well I don't think there's anything more for us to say." Merrick 
finished, sounding defeated, and Willow was suddenly afraid that the Watcher 
was going to give up on her. As he turned to go, Willow stared at him 
frantically, then back at the blonde, willing her to ask them not to go.

"I guess not." Buffy said, suddenly feeling guilty. Actually cringing as 
the hope in the redhead's eyes dimmed. "Good luck and all." She said, more 
for Willow's benefit than for his. She would regret not getting to know the 
redhead better, after all she seemed like a nice person, if a little weird.

"Oh, yeah." Merrick said, suddenly, as if something had just occured to 
him. "There is...one thing."

"What?!" Buffy asked, testily, wishing they would just go and take their 
guilt inducing looks with them.

"This." Merrick answered, quite calmly, as he drew a knife suddenly from 
under his coat and threw it at the Slayer, clapping as she caught it between 
her hands, right before it would have got her right between the eyes. 
"Bravo." He said, sounding proud as Buffy and Willow looked at him 
incredulously, and not a little bit outraged.

"Y-You threw a knife at my head." Buffy stuttured, still in shock that he 
had thrown it at her...and that she had caught it before it had done any 
damage.

"Yes. I had to show you." Merrick said, not completely understanding why 
the two girls were still looking at him in such outrage.

"But...you threw a knife...at my head." Buffy said, again, pointing at the 
indicated spot as if that would help it sink into the old man's brain.

Why didn't the girl see what this means? "And you caught it." Merrick 
explained, as if to a child. "Only the Chosen One could have caught it."

"Don't you get it?" Buffy asked, infuriated. "I don't want to be the 
Chosen one. I don't want to spend the rest of my life chasing after 
vampires. All I want to do...is graduate from high school, go to Europe, 
marry Christian Slater and die." She ranted, gesturing infatically with the 
knife. "Now that may not sound so exciting for a Scone-head like you, but I 
think it's swell." She backed him up into a corner while she ranted, taking 
great delight as he sat, quite unwillingly, onto a bench. "You come along 
and tell me I'm a member of the hairy mole club so that you can throw things 
at me?" Buffy asked, slamming the knife down hard into the wood between his 
legs, taking great delight in the flash of fear that filled his eyes at the 
close proximity of the knife and his more private parts, if he had them that 
is.

"Buffy, it was necessary." Merrick said, trying to appeal to the Slayer's 
better nature. Unfortunately for him, Buffy's anger was in control here.

"Last night, you knew I was sitting in a fresh grave didn't you?" Buffy 
asked, remembering the events of last night clearly now.

"Yes, because I had to make you aware of the implications..." Merrick never 
had a chance to finish his sentence as Buffy pulled back and hit him square 
in the nose sending the bench sliding across the floor, until it hit the 
wall behind it.

"Oh wow." She said, staring at Merrick in shock as he covered his nose with 
both hands. "I-I never hit anyone before." Surprised herself at how hard 
she had hit him, and feeling a small amount of guilt for the blood she saw 
dribbling before he managed to get a white handkerchief up
to cover it.

"Really. Well you did it perfectly." Merrick praised, still holding his 
bruised and bleeding nose.

"I didn't even break a nail." Buffy said, impressed as she checked out her 
hand. 'Not a scratch on it. Huh. I guess I really am the Slayer.'

"Now, will you begin the training?" Merrick asked, still sounding funny as 
he pinched his nose shut. Buffy looked from the man she had just punched, 
to the redhead who had watched the scene almost silently. It was more the 
pleading in the redhead's eyes then the guilt of hitting the old man that 
caused her to nod her head in wary acceptance.

...to be continued.


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