Chapter Forty-Eight
It was strange going to furniture stores and picking out sofas, tables, and other essentials to fill their apartment as though they were the epitome of a normal couple, but Buffy enjoyed the hell out of it. There was something so adult about the entire experience, so reserved solely for people who could make it this far. She had moved out of her mother’s house and into a dorm. Now she and her boyfriend had invested in an apartment for themselves. From where Spike had managed the funds, she didn’t know; only had his word that it was entirely legal and would say nothing more on the matter. Didn’t want, in his own words, to be labeled cute.
Spike and Xander were out helping the movers with their bed—a situation full of nonstop funny as far as Buffy was concerned—while she and Willow tended to the more tedious aspects of moving day. The Slayer acknowledged that it was likely cruelty to have one of her best friends move something that he didn’t want to even consider in relation to her and Spike when she was compact with strength, but similarly, she wanted some QT with the Witch.
This past week had been full of surprises. The visit from Angel that went, by in large, as expected. A bunch of yelling, accusations, name calling, offers of help that were extremely of the unwanted variety, and a retreat when he saw there was no point in his coming there in the first place.
That plus Spike’s enthusiastic celebration later that night. A week had gone by and she was still tingling from that memory alone.
Angel’s visit, though, paled in comparison to Oz’s.
It was all behind them now. Oz arriving in Sunnydale, revealing that his werewolf tendencies were under control, and demonstrated it by taking her outside and revealing that he could stand in the moonlight without suffering the change.
“And you think you made the right choice?” Buffy asked, filing away her numerous garments into the closet in the master bedroom. “I know it was hard…Sam being in Washington and suddenly Oz shows up with this big thing and…you made the right choice?”
Willow paused, her hands freezing on the picture frame she was trying to even. Evidently, Spike had an affinity for obscure art—such to the point that he had dragged the Slayer all over town earlier in the week in search of the right pieces to hang on their walls. “I’m not saying it was easy,” she replied a minute later, heaving a deep breath. “Sam being away didn’t help me at all…but really…” She turned around the next minute. “Say it was Spike, living in DC or somewhere else. That he loved you and you loved him but your relationship was complicated to the point that you couldn’t live in the same state, much less the same town. Then Angel comes by and says he’s figured out a way to make with the whoopie without going evil. Sure you’d have a boyfriend here…but—”
“I don’t love Angel.” Buffy shook her head, draping a shirt across her arm. “Not like that. Not anymore.”
“Yeah.” Willow sighed and shook her head, stepping back to admire the painting. “Seeing Oz…I guess I never thought he’d come back, you know? He left and he said he was going to be away until he found a way to fix his thing, but…how do you fix being a werewolf?”
“It’s understandable.”
“I just wish I hadn’t had to tell him that there was…” She licked her lips. “He took it well. ‘I’m involved with someone.’ ‘Is it serious?’ ‘Pretty serious, yeah.’ ‘Who is he?’ ‘He’s the Deputy Communications Director.’ ‘For who?’ ‘The President of the United States.’ ‘Hmmm. Yeah, I don’t think I can compete with that.’” The redhead moved back and took place next to Buffy, turning her attention to sorting out the clothes. “He didn’t doubt me. Didn’t even think I might’ve been…I’m involved with a guy from the White House.”
“Oz has never had a reason to doubt you before.”
“Yeah. I just…” She paused, then slammed her foot on the ground. “Why did he have to come back now?”
“To make things difficult, Will. Not on purpose, but that’s the way life works. He didn’t know you had moved on. There was no way he could’ve known that.”
There was a slam at the front, followed by Spike’s bellow that any little girlies lurking in the bedroom better move so that the men could do their work. Buffy smirked at him as they moved aside and brushed a kiss across his lips, uncaring that they were in full sight of Xander. She followed Willow into the front room and sat down on the opposing couch just as CJ finished her briefing. Another one missed, though the Slayer reckoned it was nothing worth catching this time around. For the past two days, she had been getting hounded by the press on some unconventional thing the President had done in nominating two people to the Federal Election Commission. Something that, even after Willow explained it, went way over her head. And in any regard, she didn’t particularly want to be at the sour end of a punching bag with her understanding of such matters. With as much as she was trying to up her interest in politics, there was only so much a girl could take.
“How’s Sam doing?” Buffy asked gently.
“Good. Last time I talked to him, he was going on about how mandatory minimums are racist…and that he loves me and misses me.” A poignant grin crossed the redhead’s face. “Despite all this other stuff, he’s been in a relatively good mood ever since the Mendoza confirmation. Though…” She frowned. “He had a meeting recently about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell that had him all wound up. But this thing with the President’s nominees has him really…giddy whenever we talk.”
“Have you talked to Donna? I’ve been so busy with the move, that I haven’t been able to answer her calls for a few days.”
Willow licked her lips. “She’s holding it together. Got a little jealous when some pollster that Josh had a crush on flew in to do some stuff regarding the legislative agenda that the GOP has fired back at the President for naming his people to the Federal Elections Commission.”
“Josh is still being…Josh?”
“Evidently, yeah. They haven’t even talked about it.” She sighed. “I feel so bad for her. It’s like that movie, When Harry Met Sally. I’m living a screenplay by phone every night.”
“That was a good movie.”
“To watch. Not to live.”
“Did you tell Sam about Oz?”
The Witch froze at that and looked at her as though she were crazy. “Are you kidding me? The last thing I need is Sam worrying about that, especially since Oz has already left town and the ‘entire saga of’ is over. More over, Sam has, you know, important work to do. Bothering him with that’s the last thing that needs to go down.”
“You’re telling me that he never asks how you’re doing? Just regurgitates whatever’s going down at the White House for the daily play-back that you give us?”
“Of course he—Buffy, I don’t want him worrying about me.”
“Why would he worry?”
“Because I’m over here and he’s really not? I dunno.”
A minute; Spike and Xander were tracking back from the bedroom, both looking rumpled and worn. “Beds are a bitch,” the latter said, shaking his head. “I’m Mr. Fix-It, and I say that thing cannot be done.”
Buffy quirked a brow. “Having problems?”
“Stay Puft wouldn’t let me near the damn thing ‘cause he had it under control.” The vampire rolled his eyes. “Wanna go see how bleeding controlled that is? I think the movers are baffled that anyone could mess it up so sodding much.”
Xander glared at him. “You know what, Spike? Bite me.”
“Not in your wildest, Harris.”
“You wanna become friendly with the pointy end of a stake?”
Spike quirked a brow. “’S that your way of comin’ on to me?”
Buffy jumped up and practically dove between them before the casual jesting turned into an honest-to-god fight. “Okay, boys, break it up. We just bought this furniture and I’m not looking to go replacement hunting anytime soon.”
The vampire sulked a bit, but wrapped an arm around her middle all the same, shooting an accusatory glare in Xander’s direction. “He started it,” he moped, jutting his chin slightly in the aforementioned direction.
“Figures the vampire’d be the one acting like a child,” the other man shot back.
The redhead arched her brows, barely guising her amusement. “Xander?”
“Not a word, Will.”
“I am detecting a certain pot/kettle scenario going on,” Buffy agreed. “Maybe it’s time for some air?”
The vampire’s eyes went wide and he shook his head. “Braved the sun already once today, pet,” he said. “Don’ trust Harris to not shove me outta the shade while tryin’ to make it look like an accident.”
“Xander wouldn’t do that.”
“Oh yes, Xander would,” Xander argued, though there was no threat behind his words. “Well…Xander would have at one point, but Xander thinks that Buffy would kill Xander if Xander did anything to hurt Spike…and God, have I mentioned how twisted this relationship is yet today?”
“I’m confused,” Willow said. “When did Xander become Julius Caesar?”
Spike snickered appreciatively. Everyone else just stared. He sighed. “Bloody wankers need to read somethin’ other than Cosmo every now an’ then.”
Willow met his eyes and they shared a moment of private humor.
“Did you just call me a wanker?” Buffy asked, wide-eyed.
“Well, yeh.” He grinned unabashedly as she pummeled him over the head in a bout of playfulness. “Calm down, pet. Wouldn’t mind seein’ you wank off, anyway. Could be delicious.”
“Ears!” Xander yelped. “My ears heard that!”
Spike just shrugged as Buffy blushed into his shoulder. And seconds later, the movers emerged from the bedroom, reportedly having fixed the problem. They explained that they would be back the next day with the refrigerator, and barely made it out the door without letting their self-satisfied grins surface at everything that had been said.
“On that note,” the Slayer said, her face still flaming. “I’m hungry.”
Xander frowned. “Gods get hungry?”
The vampire drew her tighter to him and flashed a cocky grin. “Like you wouldn’t believe,” he purred.
“Not that kind of hungry! God.” Harris turned to Willow in desperation. “Isn’t there a mute button or something on him?”
The Witch shrugged. “If there is, I haven’t found it.”
“Can’t you just magic him into being mute?”
Buffy arched a brow. “Xander…”
“Don’ see why you’re so skittish,” Spike drawled with a shrug. “At leas’ I’m polite enough to use innuendos. Where is Anya, again?”
Point taken. The other man looked down and grumbled something inaudible, then turned to leave. “I’m gonna go get some pizza,” he said. “And…pick up Anya. Are we still wanting to do a movie night here?”
“No busy-bodying parents, no coeds, no Watcher.” Buffy glanced around happily, cuddling into her boyfriend’s side. “I have my own apartment!”
Willow grinned. “Hey. Works out good for me, too. Now I have the dorm all to myself.” She stopped at that, frowned a bit, but shrugged the thought off and forced the smile back to her face. “Not that I have a boyfriend within a thousand mile radius to make such a thing necessary, but hey. If he ever did show up—”
“You really think you could take Sam back to the dorm room?” Xander asked, arching a brow.
“Well, no. That would be bad.”
“Of the very,” Buffy agreed. “Besides…he strikes me as the kinda guy who’d want to take you somewhere of the extravagant nature.”
Willow grinned genuinely at that. “Yeah, he’s great, isn’t he?”
“So, I’m going for movies and pizza,” Xander said, dangling his keys as though demanding approval of his plan. “Be back with Ahn in thirty to forty-five, okay?”
Buffy nodded. “Gotcha.”
The second he was gone; Spike was tugging on her arm. “Come on,” he said eagerly, moving back toward the bedroom. “Want you to see how it looks.”
The Witch’s eyes went wide at that and she quickly leapt to her feet. “Okay, and that’s my cue.”
A frown crossed the Slayer’s face. “Will?”
“You plus Spike plus bedroom equals me not here for a while,” she explained hurriedly, encouraged by the sudden rakish grin that had overwhelmed the vampire. “I’m just gonna go…get some popcorn or something. Popcorn being stuff we have at the dorm and not here because you two…just moved in and such.”
“Willow, we’re not going to—”
Spike dipped his head. “You don’ wanna?” he murmured gently, hands suddenly drawing seductive patterns at her backside. “Got a brand new bed in there jus’ achin’ to be broken in…”
Buffy swallowed hard. “Okay, maybe you should get out of here for a while.”
“Getting way outta here,” she agreed, shrugging into a lightweight jacket, then pausing to reach for the remote. “I’m just gonna check and see if the next briefing’s still on schedule. Hopefully CJ’ll recap…I missed this last one.”
The blonde couple was satisfied with that, apparently, and no longer felt the need to remain polite for their guest. Seconds later, they were bolted behind the bedroom door; the sounds alone reminding Willow exactly why she should be ecstatic to have a room to herself.
CSPAN was covering the House session. She flipped over to CNN for any word on the next briefing. And her eyes about bugged out of her sockets at the ugly headlines that tore across the screen.
A minute then before her shock turned to anger.
“I’m going to kill him.”
*~*~*
Washington DC. 8:47PM, EST
Sam swallowed down a nervous gulp when Cathy told him that Willow was on the phone. It was a call he had been dreading all day, aside his jumbled nerves that weren’t any calmer for the fact that the White House received their report card in a couple hours and the President had already sat down with him on this. Ordinarily, that would have been the worst. But no. For the better part of the night and all day until now, he had been worrying himself over a phone call from a certain fiery redhead that lived across the country.
And, quite honestly, he was surprised it had taken her so long. The rational side in him gambled that perhaps it meant she had taken time to calm down before tearing his head off…though he wouldn’t waste time by counting his blessings.
He drew in a deep breath, checked the clock, then picked up the phone.
“Hey.”
Evidently, she had not spent the day calmly assessing how best to approach her outrage.
“What the hell were you thinking?!”
Sam held up his hand, befuddled. Was it possible she had spoken with Toby before calling him?
“She was graduating. I couldn’t go to see her graduate because someone in the Leadership’s office knows that I know her. So I went to give her a present.” He shook his head. “Evidently, a friend of hers set up the meeting, confirmed Laurie is a call-girl, and the picture was taken.”
“You went to…Sam—”
“She was graduating. She’s my friend, and she was graduating. I swear that’s all that happened.”
“Sam…” A sigh rang through the hair. “God, is everything all right? Did the President—”
“The President knows. I had a moderately uncomfortable conversation with him this morning, but he knows. And Toby came to my defense, which was rather unexpected as I thought he would be the first to shove me out the door.”
She sighed again, calmer now. “So you’re not going to be fired?”
“Not going to be fired.” He smiled gently. “I feel bad for CJ, since she’s going to be the one that needs to convince the press and the country that I did nothing wrong, but what’s done is done. I…I just needed her to know that I was thinking about her when she graduated, Willow. I would never—”
“I know.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I just…”
He heard her draw in another deep breath as the thought died, then frowned at the crashing sounds in the background. “Where are you?”
“Spike and Buffy’s.”
“Are they…?”
“Yeah.” A pause. “God, you can hear them?”
“Well, they are pretty loud.”
He could practically see her flushing. “Yeah. I was helping them move in. They just got their new place. I should’ve waited to call, but I was just checking the thing for the next briefing and saw this.”
“Oh, so you just—”
“Yeah. Didn’t have time to catch anything else today…television or otherwise.”
“Oh.” Sam let out a long sigh, the tension of the day finally crashing down. “I’m glad you called. I was getting worried that you never wanted to talk to me again, but I didn’t know how to start that conversation. ‘By the way, sweetie, did you see that I made front-page news with a call girl?’”
A dry chuckle at that. “Yeah. I can see why you would be hesitant.”
“Actually, listen. There’s this other thing. The President mentioned something about getting you and whoever else can come out to DC pretty soon. Every day, he reminds us that he wants to meet Spike.” He glanced down to his desk, then again to the clock. He needed to be in the Oval soon. “I thought it might also be fun for you guys to see him speak in person. He’s doing this town hall meeting thing in Rosslyn next week.”
“Town hall meeting?”
“Talk to some kids and stuff, answer the important questions. You want to come?” A nervous shrill attacked his voice, and he suddenly felt like the brain in the senior class asking the head cheerleader out to prom, though he knew Willow would resent the notion. He wanted the President to meet her so badly.
He wanted her in DC. These two weeks apart weren’t doing either of them any favors.
“Do I want to come?” she repeated, incredulous. “Do I want to come hear the President speak? Do I want to be in Washington DC instead of looking at press briefings all day? Do I want…yes I want to come, you big egghead!”
He was beaming. “Hey!”
“Sam, this is…really? You really want me there?”
“Okay, now you’re being an egghead.”
“This is awesome! Oh my god, oh my god!”
“Think you can talk Spike and Buffy into coming?”
A sound echoed over the receiver at that that sounded very much like the couple in question had reached such a point, and several times over.
Willow giggled. “Yes, I’m sure I can.”
“And Giles? Is he back yet?”
“No, he got sucked into this thing…I can call him, though. See if he can manage to get back in time.”
“Right. Well, just make sure you can come. Personally, you’re the only one I’m worried with.”
“God, this is amazing!” His heart warmed at the sound of her excitement. And despite all else, the day was turning out to be a good one. “I love you, Sam.”
A grin tickled his lips. He would never tire of those words. “I love you, too.”
“And I’ll see you next week.”
“Yes. And I’ll make sure you never want to go back.”
“Really, at this point, it wouldn’t take very much. Now get going so you can get to your meeting.”
“How’d you know about my meeting?”
“There’s always a meeting. Love you. Now shoo!”
Sam was grinning like a madman when he hung up the phone. Next week. He would see her again next week. After two weeks of separation, and he could see her next week.
Oh yeah. Today had definitely been a good day.
To be concluded