Trust - Chapter 19

Giles's eyes were open when Buffy tiptoed into his room, and he was sitting up in bed, which she took as a good sign. When she bent over to kiss him, though, it was all she could do not to jerk away at the heat of his forehead against his lips.

"Wow, that's some fever you've got going there, sweetie," she said.

"I'm all right," he answered automatically, though a little breathlessly. "Do they tell you when I'm to go home?"

"When you're better," Buffy answered, trying to sound reassuring. "Soon."

It distressed her, though, when Giles gave a kind of half-hearted nod, and told her, "I'm so very tired." She'd never in her life expected to hear those words from him, of all people.

Still, why shouldn't he be tired? He'd been through a lot. Maybe this just marked the beginning of a new era of honesty between them, one in which Giles actually said how he felt. God knows, she said how she felt often enough.

"I know," she told him soothingly. "And you can rest whenever you want. Only don't you want some breakfast first? I checked with the nurses, and it's okay. In fact, they'd like you to try to eat something, since you didn't touch your yummy hospital oatmeal."

Giles made a face at the very thought.

"So, I thought, who can blame him? Which is why I got Celeste to cook for you. C'mon, you know it's gonna be good."

As an answer, Giles rolled over onto his side. "I'm not a child, Buffy."

"And who said you were?" She set insulated food-carrier thingy Celeste had sent with her on the floor beside the bed and leaned over him, trailing her fingertips over his hot cheek. "I know you feel yucky and nothing sounds even vaguely edible, but otherwise how are you gonna get better? IV fluids are only good for so much, Giles."

He lay there for a moment, just breathing, but Buffy kept catching from him little flashes of impatience, small surges of anger.

"I bet you kind of feel like you've been put through the wringer this summer," she said, and to her surprise Giles gave a soft laugh.

"Rather," he answered.

"So maybe this is the end to it all?"

Instead of answering, he scooted over in the bed.

"Come lie with me?" he asked.

"But isn't that gonna hurt you?"

"Oh, very likely," Giles told her. "And yet, I shall endeavor to steel myself." His eyes got a little bit of a twinkle on that one, which made Buffy's heart do a complicated leaping thing. He was teasing her, and if he could tease her, he was going to be all right. She slid off her shoes and lay down next to him, on her side, her hand rubbing gently over his chest. After a while Giles's face lost its tense, stressed look, and started to look sleepy and contented instead. In a little while, Buffy started to feel sleepy too, and the next thing she knew, one of the breathing therapist people--a guy this time--was coming in start up his treatment.

"Uh!" she said, sitting bolt upright with a feeling of total discombobulation. Her eyes were all bleary and she ran her hands down over her hair, trying to combat the worst of a bad case of bed-head. She also had a sneaking suspicious that she'd been drooling on Giles's shoulder. He was grinning at her.

"Shut up, you," Buffy told him, even though he hadn't said anything, and thumped his arm gently with the backs of her fingers. "I come here on a mission of mercy, and this is the thanks I get?"

"I rather doubt Florence Nightingale ever fell asleep on one of her patients," Giles said, still grinning, until the therapist stuck the weird little tube thing that he was supposed to breathe through into his mouth, and the machine itself started hissing and steaming too loud to talk over. Buffy stayed perched on the edge of his bed, holding Giles's splinted hand for the fifteen minutes or so the treatment took. Afterwards, he coughed a lot, one arm holding hard around his cracked ribs until Buffy found a spare pillow at the top of the closet and gave him that to hold against his chest instead.

When he'd finally gotten the coughing under control, Giles just kind of sank back into bed, looking melted.

"You ready to sleep now?" she asked.

Giles shook his head. "Bloody drugs."

"How about if I tell you about the outside world, and you nod off to my incessant babble?"

"I called it that once, didn't I?" he said softly. "What a prat I was."

"I'm not exactly sure what a prat is," Buffy told him. "But you weren't one. I would have driven Mother Teresa crazy with the whole boys-clothes-Angel-you-never-let-me-do-anything vibe I had going on. I probably should be in the Guinness Book of World Records for longest stretch of continuous whining."

"Not unless I'm listed directly after for Stuffiest Living Human." Giles shifted a little, looking uncomfortable, though whether that was a physical thing or emotional, Buffy couldn't tell.

"You weren't stuffy," she said, running her thumb lightly over the back of his hand. "Okay, maybe a little. But mostly I think you were just tired. And homesick, sometimes. And maybe, just maybe, now and then, kinda overwhelmed?"

Giles's eyes brightened at that, and Buffy knew she'd hit the nail right on the head. "So, can we let the past just be...past?"

He was quiet for a minute, and then he answered. "I'd be willing. I've always been willing."

"So..." Buffy shifted, getting herself comfortable but trying not to hurt him at the same time. "The outside world. Moira's back. You knew that?"

Giles shook his head slightly.

"She's very...I dunno...frosty I guess is the word. To me. At the moment. She has this whole Wesley-protectiveness thing going on. And I'm not exactly feeling fountains of Wesley joy right now. Not after he hurt my guy."

Giles's eyes went from green to a wintery silveriness, and he said, in a soft voice, "He killed me."

Buffy's stomach did a twisting thing, hearing him speak those words, but she answered, lightly, "I'm glad you got over it."

Giles's mouth opened, as if he meant to say something, and that little vee of lines that meant he was stressed, or worried, or thinking really hard, appeared between his eyebrows. "I knew..." he finally told her, sounding as if the words were being torn out of him. "I knew that if I didn't let... That is, I knew the demon was too strong for him, that if he wasn't allowed to drink from me, he would have gone after Xander, and after...after Willow, I believed that might have broken the poor boy beyond our power to repair. He oughtn't to have been in that place. That terrible place..." Giles's breathing got funny then, all harsh and whistle-y, like high notes and low notes being played on some weird instrument, and then he started coughing again, sometimes in hard, seal-like barks and sometimes in nothing more than weird little squeaks, curled over on his side while Buffy held the pillow to his chest again, hoping vainly that doing so would at least be some help in keeping his hurt ribs from being jerked around. She even managed not to freak out while she did it--until she saw the bright red of blood on his mouth.

Her fingers seemed to find the call button all on their own, and when a voice came over the intercom to ask was wrong, all she could do was babble, "Help him. Help him."

It seemed like forever before the nurse came, and with her a doctor who looked only about twelve years old--not exactly confidence inspiring. But both of them seemed so non-panicked as they worked--shooting a couple syringes of something into Giles's IV, turning up his oxygen, calling back the respiratory guy--that she started to calm down despite herself. It helped that after a few minutes the things they'd done had Giles lying quiet again and breathing almost normally.

"I know it's alarming," Dr. Doogie said to her, "But whatever the stuff was he got into, it's left his airways pretty irritated, which makes them reactive, and with all that coughing, it's not unheard of for a blood vessel or two to break. Doesn't mean there's anything dire going on."

"Really?" Buffy said faintly, thinking he was probably lying to her so she wouldn't get all hysterical.

"Really," he assured her. "I'm not saying your...um...friend is in the world's greatest shape right now, but you don't have to worry too much. And that's on the level. Nurse Caulkin here would be the first to tell you I have no poker face. If I was fibbing to make you feel better, you'd know."

Buffy moved her eyes to the nurse, who grinned at her and nodded. "Worst poker player I ever met. He's not a bad doctor, though. You can trust him."

After checking the IV lines and glancing at a couple dials, they left.

A little while later, Giles told her, "Sorry about that," in a soft, raspy voice.

"Hey. No apologies," Buffy told him, but with what had happened she didn't like to pick up the thread of their original conversation. "How 'bout if you rest now? Do you want me to turn on the TV?"

Giles shook his head slightly, looking weak and glazed and miserable. His eyes went halfway closed. Buffy touched his cheek again, thinking that he felt hotter, if such a thing was possible.

"Hey," she said softly. "I brought a book. Nothing up to your usual standards, but I could read to you. It has magic and monsters and stuff, so you'll probably like it."

Something almost like a smile played over Giles's mouth.

Buffy reached under the bed, rooting through her bag until she found what she was looking for, then pulled up the visitor's chair, settling as best she could into its not-exactly-comfortable upholstery.

"Okay, here goes," she said. "Chapter One, The Boy Who Lived." Buffy had always loved the way her mom read to her when she was little, and she tried to remember how that went, with the different voices, and putting expression in, and everything.

"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley," Buffy began, "Of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense..." She gave a quick glance over the top of the book.

Perfectly still now, his eyes half-closed, Giles was definitely smiling.

Buffy read on.

Only a day or so before, her world had attempted to change itself, to drag her back into that existence of mousy, obedient powerlessness in which she'd spent the first eighteen years of her life. Willow had fought against the sea-change with all her might, twisting herself into the fibers of magic around her as a drowning woman might lash herself to a mast or a spar, anything that would keep her afloat in the surging waters.

But enough with the nautical similes. She'd recovered now. Someone had tried to drag her back. Someone was going to pay.

Her immediate thought was Giles. Meddling Giles, who'd poisoned Buffy's mind against her, making the Slayer no fun to toy with after all. Know-it-all Giles, too afraid of magic to be half the wizard he might have been if he'd had the balls. Or if he'd used the balls he had for anything besides screwing his Slayer brainless. Not that that was much of a stretch.

Well, she'd teach him to mind his own business. Oh, yes she would.

Willow lay on her back on the pile of silken cushions in the white pavilion, gazing up at the canopy overhead. It was painted like a night sky and jeweled with constellations, and if you knew how to look right, you could see fate recorded there.

She knew how to look right. After a while, she began to smile.

After another while, Morgana returned. She'd been doing something that should have seemed unspeakable with the dead LeFaye witch's body, and her fingers smelled of blood and greenness and honey. She lay down beside Willow on the cushions and offered her sweet red wine from a jeweled cup.

Willow drank. She always, on principle, took whatever Morgana offered. The wine went to her head, making her feel slow and lazy and brilliant. Morgana rarely touched her anymore, but she no longer really needed to be touched. She had everything she needed, right there inside her.

She knew what Giles was afraid of, which wasn't much. Three things, really--but they were biggies. She could get some milage out of them. Out of one of them, anyway.

Eyghon. That was a given. Only Eyghon, even if she called him back from wherever the bad demons go, was clumsy and uncertain. Willow preferred to stay away from the big, drastic gestures. Ditto for the Ripper demon.

Losing Buffy...she'd be bound to get some good stuff out of that. Only maybe not. Seeing Giles descend into a leaden, drunken despair might have its points, but she'd rather go for something a little more active, a little more fun.

Angelus, though...oh, that would be sweet. She knew how Giles's blood pressure shot up something like forty points just being in the same room with broody, mournful Angel. For Angelus to return...

Willow laughed aloud, making Morgana smile and ask her, "What is it, love?"

She'd cast the spell that gave Angel back his soul, and that gave her power over him. What the lord giveth, the lord taketh away. Only make that double for the lady. She felt in the mood for some takething.

Besides which, Angel's demon deserved a chance to get out and play. He'd been squashed beneath that guilty soul for way too long now.

She'd have to run the idea past her new friend Melissa, but Melissa always seemed up for a little fun. Willow even trusted the vampire, especially since good ol' Mel had told her she didn't smell like food anymore.

She smelled like smoke and fire.

She smelled like magic.

On the third day, Xander forced himself to haul ass out of bed. He'd been taking the antibiotics the hospital had given him, when he remembered, and drunk up all the Coke he'd bought, and the bottled water, finally going on to gulping up big amounts of chlorine-y tasting water right out of the bathroom tap. The thought of food still made him cringe, but he seemed to be thirsty all the time.

He couldn't stay here anymore, though. He couldn't. And so he spent a long time leaning against the wall of the shower, letting the water run over his body until all the hot ran out and only cold was left. He didn't mind. He should have started with cold in the first place. At the end he felt clean, but washed out, as if a lot of the strength he'd thought had come back to him had just run on down the drain.

Not that it mattered. Not that anything mattered.

Shaking, feeling dizzy, he packed up the few things he'd brought with him, took the Do Not Disturb sign off the door and hiked over to the office to turn in his key. Though it was morning, the same guy slumped behind the counter, watching some sort of game show on a snowy 13-inch TV.

"Hey, kid," he said. "Feeling better?"

"Yeah," Xander lied. "Fine."

And that was it. He plodded back up the road for the rest of his stuff, surprised to find the Aries K sitting no more than half a mile from the truckstop. Three nights ago, it had seemed like the longest walk he'd ever taken. He'd left the car unlocked, too, but nobody had made off with a thing, so Xander just stuffed it all back in his duffle.

He'd just rest there for a minute, and then...

When he opened his eyes, he felt baked alive, and the shadows were stretched out long and spindly over the ground. For a minute, he couldn't remember where he was, then, when he remembered, he didn't care. The gash in his neck itched and stung, probably with the sweat that had run into it, and he felt like a big, swollen, Xander-shaped balloon, bobbing along at the end of its string. It wasn't a bad feeling, not really, and it let him drift back to the roadhouse, where he actually managed to bum a ride from a north-bound trucker.

The guy was going to Eureka, too. Eureka, not Yreka but, see, his lies were almost coming true. Even if there wouldn't be any girl, mad at him or otherwise, waiting when he got there.

The trucker listened to the same Garth Brooks tape all the way up to their destination, the two sides flipping automatically back and forth, back and forth. Sometimes, too, it seemed that Garth was sitting between him and the driver, his cowboy hat taking up so much space Xander found himself squished against the door.

"You, son," the country singer said to him in his mellow good-old-boy voice, "Are such a loser. Your mama know how you turned out? 'Cause if she don't, don't you tell her. You'll be like to break her heart."

"No one really talks like that," Xander informed him. "And besides, my mama's a drunk. She hardly even knows what day it is, half the time."

"You watch your mouth, Alexander," his Gramma Mahoney said, taking Garth's place in the cab. Her brown eyes were sparking at him, and her blue-rinsed hair seemed to be standing on end. "Because if you don't, young man, it's the Life Buoy for you! That's my daughter you're talking about, and alcoholism is a disease. You ever think to try to help her, instead of all your lies and your running away?"

"I'm not the grown-up, she is," Xander insisted stubbornly, but he knew that was a lie. He'd fought demons, and faced death, but he wouldn't raise a hand to help his own mom? How selfish was he?

And then he knew the truth. "How could I help her, gramma? I can't even help myself. I'm scared all the time and I'm mad all the time and I just let Giles die."

Gramma Mahoney gave him a sad look, and then her features just kind of melted like wax and she got bigger and taller and her face got a whole like meaner, with a hard scowl and eyes like the heads of rusty nails. His dad's face.

"I'll rip your heart out," Bill Harris said. "And I'd rip your balls off, if they weren't too small to find. And then I'll just... Eat. You. Up." At which point he'd turned into the Kindestod, like in the old picture in Giles's book, and his eyes on their stalks were coming out and out and his mouth was opening, and...

Xander screamed, his head feeling like it was going to split apart into fifty pieces, and once he'd started, he didn't feel like he'd ever be able to stop screaming again.