Nerves ate at her stomach as she walked along the dimly lit hallway. Should she be this nervous? Shouldn’t she be filled with righteous indignation? With anger? With something other than apprehension at seeing her own daughter?
Joyce swallowed and tried for one of those.
Nope. No use. There was nothing there but anxiety.
She was scared to death of visiting with her own child. She vaguely wondered how many other mothers felt this way. Then she wondered how many other mothers even had daughters to visit. Then she couldn’t take the direction of her thoughts and started counting her steps.
It was better than looking around at her guards, all huge and hulking. Or at the non-dungeon rooms she walked through. Freedom granted for but a taste.
Or thinking. About Buffy and what she was doing now. About the relationship – or lack thereof –between mother and daughter. About Buffy’s relationship – very much thereof – with Angelus. About Hank…there were so many things to think about there, Joyce didn’t know where to begin.
So many regrets.
She felt old. Old and useless. Her life was one big regret, and yet she had no idea how to fix it. Apologies only went so far. She could do but what would she do? She was trapped in the dungeons, not about to be let free (not that she knew what she’d do then), with nothing to occupy her save thoughts she didn’t want to think.
And then she was there. Mere steps from the outside. The air was heavier here, but at the same time cleaner. The dungeons were cleaned daily, so maybe the scent was her imagination. Not that she could ever be accused of having a great one, but times change.
People did.
She wondered if she had. Hoped so.
Another step.
Hank had come outside for lunch with Buffy, and wasn’t back yet. God, she hoped this wasn’t some family reunion. Talk about awkward.
Joyce couldn’t stand her own company most days.
The guards said nothing, and she wondered if they could speak. They merely looked at her, watching her with those large eyes, and waited. What kind of orders did they have? What did they expect of her?
What did she expect of herself?
One last step.
Outside.
Breathing deeply, she wondered if freedom really did have a different taste, scent. Feel. She swallowed and nodded to the waiting demons. Huh, funny how that was the first time she’d thought that word. Demons.
They led the way through a maze of greenery amid the desert red, until she saw Buffy sitting alone on a bench, trays of fruit around her, a glass of something in her hands. Great, her daughter was drinking.
Not that Joyce could exactly blame her, but still. She was only seventeen…wasn’t that a Fleetwood Mac song?
“Mom.”
She hadn’t looked up, but nodded as if she had. As if she wasn’t staring intently into the rather ornate goblet she held. As if she’d risen as graciously as she was dressed, the consummate hostess.
“Buffy.”
She felt like a fool.
“Please,” she did look up now, but her face was unreadable. “Sit. Would you like something to eat?”
“Yes, please,” she nodded and stiffly sat on the bench.
Oh, no, this wasn’t awkward. It was worse.
“Mrs. Summers.”
Joyce squeaked and jumped at the voice. Whirling, she saw Spike. The one who was supposed to help Buffy. Help her stop this. Help her…hmm, there was something else there she couldn’t quite remember.
“Spike,” she nodded, and smiled. It felt as forced as it probably looked. “Good to see you out and about.”
He made an odd snorting/chortling sound, and went back to his position holding up the wall. She cast him one last puzzled look and turned back to Buffy.
Her daughter watched her with that same expression of neutrality, a small china plate filled with assorted fruits and vegetables held out for her. Taking it, Joyce searched for something to say.
“How’s Angelus?”
Spike snorted, Buffy glared – at him, not at her – and Joyce wondered what all she’d missed down in the dungeons.
The silence was heavy and oppressive, but she couldn’t find another topic.
“He’s fine.”
She watched Buffy pick at cut cantaloupe, before raising her head.
“You look tired, Buffy,” she said softly, putting aside the plate. Her stomach couldn’t really handle food. It was too busy being attacked by butterflies. “Has…” Angelus been treating you well? Have things been terrible up here for you? Is it really what Willow insists, that you need to fight?
“Have,” she changed, “you been getting enough rest?”
Buffy snorted, and shot a fiery look at her. Ah, there was her daughter. Still, it didn’t bode well for an answer.
“That’s your big question? If I’m getting enough sleep? Or how’s Angelus? Those are what you want to know?”
“No.” Joyce snapped. “I want to know what’s really happening with you. I want to know what’s between you and Angelus – really between you. Not dungeon speculation, not what Giles says, not what that infernal Whistler sneers. I want to know what’s happening in my daughter’s life.”
She took a deep breath. “And I want a real shower with some coffee. You have no idea the withdrawal I’ve been through!”
Buffy snorted in amusement, and shook her head. Still, no response. Well, this was good and fucked up, wasn’t it.
Deflating, Joyce tried again. “Buffy, I have no idea what to say to you. Anything I ask I know won’t be right. I don’t know, not really, what’s going on up here. I don’t know what you’re doing, or feeling. And I certainly don’t know what Spike’s doing here.”
“He’s making sure I don’t do something rash.”
“Such as?”
She opened her mouth to reply, but tilted her head to one side. “I don’t know. As my guardian vampire, you’d think he’d have a goal – don’t let Buffy do such and such.”
“I’ll have you know,” Spike said with as much dignity as it sounded like he could muster, “that I’m here to see to your overall well being.”
She raised an eyebrow at him, and Joyce was struck anew at the changes in her daughter. And Spike for that matter. She turned to face him.
“You’re here to…what? Make sure she eats?”
“I’m not a nursemaid.” He spat. Joyce raised an eyebrow and he growled. “I’m here to ensure her well being until Angelus returns from England.”
“What’s he doing in England?”
“Seeing to my well being.” Buffy was looking at her again, and she wondered what lay behind those eyes. What secrets her daughter held, what pain.
“By not being here with you?” she shook her head. “Honey, I don’t see how that’s seeing to you at all.” She stopped when an awful thought struck her. “He’s not…I mean…” she glanced in the general direction of Spike but no matter how soft her voice, he’d probably hear. “He’s not off with some other woman, is he?”
Buffy snorted, but there was a flash of pain she couldn’t hide. It was there and gone, but Joyce worried over it.
“No, he’s there wiping out the council, so they don’t send any more assassins after me.”
Joyce opened her mouth, but nothing emerged. “Oh,” she said finally, voice faint. “Well then.”
They sat in silence again, and for lack of anything else to do, she nibbled on the fruit tray. It really was delicious.
“Assassin?” she asked eventually.
“Yeah, they thought that by killing me they could…” Buffy looked confused for a moment. “I don’t really know what their little goal was, actually. Maybe just to kill me.”
To her credit, Joyce didn’t even blink when Spike growled.
“This is the same Council that controls the watchers and slayers? Then it seems they’d have a goal. They don’t strike me as the impulsive type. Too much red tape and all.”
That earned a ghost of a smile. “Whatever their reason, they didn’t see fit to share it with me.”
More silence. It made her itchy, jumpy. And did nothing to help her nerves.
“Do you think that you’d have let me back home?”
The question wasn’t as unexpected as it might have been. Joyce swallowed the watermelon past the lump in her throat and nodded.
“Yes. Of course, who knows what would’ve happened between then and when you returned. But yes.”
“Then why’d you say it.”
“Buffy,” she said exasperatedly, “I’d just learned that you do things I’m still coming to terms with. Everything from the last year or so makes more sense now, and the more I think about it, the more I question everything. When you were going back out, I…well, I’m not exactly sure what I was thinking.”
She’d been thinking that any teenager who disobeyed their mother deserved to be grounded. Stupid normal rules.
“We haven’t had the best relationship, true, but I like to think that we’d have grown closer once you stopped being a bratty teen.”
“Bratty?!”
Joyce laughed, though Buffy’s exclamation was angry, not indignant. “Honey, all teens are bratty. I hated those years and can’t understand why anyone would want to relive them. Best they’re gone, and done with and the bad hair pictures burned.”
Slowly, she nodded, softening. This whole parenting thing was supposed to last several more years before they reached this point. Joyce was in no way prepared for such a sudden shift. It added to the unnerving aspect of her day.
“And once I’d returned?” Buffy asked.
“I have no idea. I know I’d like to think things would’ve been great, but plans never go as we want them to.”
“I never planned on this happening,” she said quietly.
“I know. Karma’s a bitch, and when Fate decides to bite you in the ass, you’re screwed.”
She laughed at the curses, and Joyce could see some of the tension ease. But there was still pain behind her eyes, and she worried it’d never leave.
“Now why don’t you tell me why you brought me out here.”
“I’ve decided that I need to get on with my life.” She nodded, and waited for more. Buffy exhaled and admitted, “I don’t really know what that life is going to be, so I’m starting fresh.”
“I’d like it if we could do that. I don’t think it’ll work, there’ll always be our past between us, but honey, I don’t want to lose you.”
“We’re never going to have a normal mother daughter relationship, are we.”
It wasn’t a question, and that broke Joyce’s heart. Another piece of the ever-changing puzzle snapped into permanent place. Normalcy. It was what she wanted, what her daughter wanted. They went at it from different angles, and neither achieved it.
Like mother, like daughter.
“No, I’m afraid not. But can you imagine how boring that’d be?”
Another laugh, a little longer, a little louder, a little freer. Progress. Now if she could only work on herself.
These revelations were all well and good, but they did little to actually help the situation. Or help her figure out what she wanted from the situation. Or if she wanted anything. And what that thing was or is or…
She was getting a migraine.
“What’re you going to do?” At Buffy’s puzzled look, she added, “I mean as a life. You can’t exactly go to college, and I doubt there are any jobs for the goddess of the world.”
“I hadn’t made it that far. This was a twenty-minute ago decision.”
“Ah.”
Buffy stood, and walked to the wall separating gardens from desert, private world from conquered world. And what the hell was on her back?
“Buf-”
But then Spike was in her line of sight and blocking Buffy from view. Frantically shaking his head and motioning like a fiend.
“No,” he mouthed, “no, no, no!”
Raising an eyebrow, she slowly nodded. Okay, whatever.
“Ah…can I have some art supplies?” She said instead with one last look at Spike who now stood at his previous place against the wall. Of course Buffy had turned back around. What the hell. She knew they’d move fast, but that was just…wow.
“What would you paint?” she asked. “The town red?”
Joyce snorted at the irony of it. “I think it’s red enough, thanks.” She cleared her throat. “But, I do need something to do. I can’t exactly open an art gallery – I doubt demons have much taste in art, no matter how they worship you. And do you even have currency anymore?”
“You haven’t painted since I was ten,” she said quietly.
Inexplicable tears welled in her eyes. “I know. That was when…”
“When you and daddy started arguing.”
“Yes. It wasn’t you,” she insisted. “Never you. I know things got worse when you…and the slaying…” she shook her head. “It’s all a little confusing. But it was never you.”
She saw her daughter swallow, the sheen of tears she was unable to hide. Joyce rose and walked to her, wrapping her arms around the girl who was her daughter and the woman who ruled the world.
“You look so grown up,” she murmured.
“Paints.” Buffy pulled back and nodded. The tears were gone, and though her voice shook, it was even enough. “Yes, all right.”
Turning to Spike she said, “Bring Xander to me.”
He protested, hemmed and hawed over leaving her, but Joyce saw the look in his eyes. Whatever he wanted to say or do to Xander, he knew this was his chance.
The vampire left, and mother and daughter continued their awkward conversation. By the time Xander entered the clearing, they laughed like they had during their first year in Sunnydale. When Xander came into view, she felt Buffy stiffen.
Things looked bleak for Xander…
“I’ll talk to you soon, mom,” she whispered as they hugged.
Joyce nodded, unexpected tears in her eyes as she kissed Buffy’s cheek. “I miss you, darling.”
Spike walked her to the edge of the maze, glancing over his shoulder as they walked.
“You don’t like leaving her?”
“I don’t like leaving her with that traitor.” He was growling, and she thought that maybe there was more to it than that. Wisely, she kept her thoughts to herself.
“What was on her back?” she asked instead.
“Angelus’ artwork. If you ever do open another art gallery, you might start with pieces from our god.”
Speechless, she stopped at the opening of the maze, glancing from the hulking guards to Spike. “Why?” she whispered eventually.
“Ownership. Big fight, big make up, big deal for him. He didn’t want anyone questioning their relationship with each other.”
“And is it a relationship?” she demanded.
He paused, looked back as if he could see through the thick bushes. “Yeah. And I think he’s finally realizing that.”
“Has she kicked his ass yet?”
Spike snorted. “No, but I have a feeling that when he returns, you’ll hear the fight from your current home.”
Joyce smiled, she couldn’t help it. “Good. I didn’t raise
my daughter to cower.”
”Oh, don’t worry, Joyce,” Spike grinned and began backing away. “She gives as
good as she gets.”
Nodding, mostly satisfied with the way the day went, Joyce walked back to the dungeons feeling much better than she had on the earlier walk.
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