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Buffy’s entire house smelled of herbs, smoke, and microwaved popcorn, which could only mean one thing: Willow was visiting.
It had been…a minor ordeal, attempting to come up with some non-vampire-related explanation for her relationship with Angel and its current status, but somehow, Joyce had bought it. She was pretty stellar at allowing Buffy to pull the wool over her eyes. She’d even believed that it was superstition that was keeping Angel out of their house; she also didn’t seem to mind that this was the second night in a row that Willow was sleeping over.
“I’m glad that the ritual worked,” Willow said, flicking through TV channels before she landed on an episode of Clueless. “At least there’s one place in Sunnydale where we can all feel safe and cosy.”
Buffy nodded quietly, squeezing in next to Willow on the couch. There was plenty of room for them to spread out but Buffy had this irrational fear that, were she to leave more than an inch between her and Willow, something terrible might happen to her.
Something terrible could have happened to her – Angelus had been in her room .
“This is the safe house,” Buffy confirmed, attempting to speak with a light voice. “Safest place in town with the best TV channels.”
“You got that right,” Willow said, snuggling up to Buffy. “I’m pretty much barred from the TV on Tuesday nights, ‘cause mom needs the room for her book club.”
“Booo,” Buffy replied sympathetically. The tightness in her chest actually seemed to ease for the first time in several weeks . The normality of a conversation about TV and parents being totally square? It kind of provided the ideal distraction from Slayer responsibilities for a while. “You’re always welcome to come be a couch potato with me. Mi casa es su casa, you know?”
“Thanks Buffy, I–” Willow’s response was cut off abruptly by the shrill ringing of the phone. She let it ring once, thinking that Joyce might pick it up. However, the sound of the shower running upstairs told her that…no, she wasn’t getting out of this one.
“I got it!” she yelled up the stairs as she dragged herself away from her comfy spot on the couch, sandwiched between Willow and one of her mom’s plumped throw cushions. “It’s probably just someone selling something – literally who calls this late?”
“Hello?” Buffy spoke into the receiver, forcing herself to sound happy to be answering the phone, just in case it was someone important.
“Buffy, Buffy it’s me. It’s Jenny, I–”
Buffy felt her shoulders stiffen. So, what? She couldn’t even get away from this in the comfort of her own home? If Miss Calendar wanted to make it right with Giles, she wasn’t using Buffy as a go-between. “What do you want?” Buffy demanded, all of the false bubbliness draining from her voice. She just wanted to end the call as fast as possible. She had enough on her plate.
When Miss Calendar’s reply came through the phone, her words were fast, spoken in a panicked hush. “Look, I know that I’m the last person you want to hear from right now, but– but I’m in the school and I don’t have long left, okay?” Buffy’s heart plummeted, landing in the depths of her stomach with a dull thud . Miss Calendar said something else, but Buffy wasn’t listening.
“Wait, what?” Buffy interrupted. Willow had begun to pay attention, muting the TV and sitting up on the couch to watch Buffy. “Miss Calendar, what do you mean?” At the mention of the teacher’s name, Willow practically sprinted across the room, standing behind Buffy close enough that she could feel her friend’s breathing against the skin of her neck.
But that wasn’t the cause of the prickles that sprung up on her skin.
“Buffy,” Willow muttered, “what’s wrong? Why is Miss Calendar calling? Is something up with Giles?”
Buffy ignored Willow, addressing Miss Calendar again. “What’s going on?”
“Don’t worry about me, okay? ” Miss Calendar pleaded, and Buffy could sense the panic in her voice, something that she hadn’t heard before. Had she really always been levelheaded and cool, or had Buffy simply failed to notice otherwise? “I just…I have something that will help you to defeat Angelus – restore his soul – there’s a yellow–”
“Is he there?” At the mention of Angelus, everything fell into place. Miss Calendar, frightened, calling from a number that Buffy recognised now as the one for the phone in Giles’ office…she was alone in the school at night. She ‘didn’t have long left’ ... “Miss Calendar, please. Is Angelus there?”
Willow gasped behind her. “What?! Buffy, oh my god – is she okay? Buffy, is she okay?” Willow repeated herself, her voice raising at least two octaves as her breathing quickened whilst Buffy tried to keep her composure.
When Miss Calendar’s answer came through the phone, Buffy knew what she had to do.
“ Yes .”
Buffy didn’t stall before slamming the phone down on the receiver, running towards the front door before she even had a chance to grab her coat. She did, however, grab for the handy crossbow that she’d stashed behind her mom’s side cabinet, just in case.
“Buffy, wait!” Willow cried, her chin wobbling.
“We don’t have time, Willow!” Buffy responded, already halfway out the door. “Tell my mom that I’ve gone to fetch some takeout.”
“ No,” Willow answered with determination, “I’m not letting you go alone.”
There was no time to argue; Buffy simply held the door open for Willow.
This would’ve been a great time for either of them to gain the sudden ability to drive. Unfortunately, neither of them could , so all that they could do was run. Buffy had always cursed Sunnydale for being a pretty small town, but that night she found herself grateful for the fact that it didn’t really have a whole lot of blocks as she charged towards the school, Willow in tow.
Neither of them spoke as they rounded the corner towards Sunnydale High, making a full-speed beeline towards the back entrance of the library. In the silence, Buffy could hear Willow’s erratic breathing, her snotty nose as silent tears tracked down her cheeks.
When they reached the door to the library, Buffy could see through the frosted window that the lights were out, but could still make out some movement at the far corner. Near Giles’ office.
Miss Calendar.
Buffy braced herself, stepping back and inviting Willow to do the same. She stood watching, her breaths shallow and fast from exertion as Buffy kicked down the door in one attempt.
The sudden crash and thud of the door being sent flying off its hinges had the desired effect on Angelus, who was caught so entirely off guard that he was distracted from his violent task. A task that involved Miss Calendar, eyes rolling back into her head as she was pinned against the slightly wonky door to Giles’ office. Willow screamed as Miss Calendar’s body was dropped from Angelus’ iron grip, crumpling to the floor like a rag doll with a thud. Something clattered to the floor with her, rolling across the floor of the library
Buffy didn’t get the chance to hold Willow back before she surged towards Miss Calendar; Angel wasn’t interested in her, though, his expression morphing into a twisted smile as he registered Buffy’s presence.
“Hello, lover,” he sneered, and Buffy didn’t even hesitate before pressing down the release on her crossbow, an arrow flying through the air before sinking itself deep into Angelus’ shoulder. He didn’t scream, but she didn’t miss the slight wince. “That's the best you got?” he taunted, and Buffy had to force her eyes to stay on his face, to not stray downwards to where Willow was gently but urgently checking for a pulse on Miss Calendar’s wrists, her neck.
Her neck. Even in the dim light of the moon, Buffy could make out the dark red beginnings of a nasty cluster of bruises, the slightly blue tinge of her lips…she was halfway dead.
“ CPR!” Buffy screamed across the room to Willow before turning back to Angelus. “I could kill you right here, right now,” she said, managing to control the tremble in her words as she spoke.
“Why don’t you, then?” Angelus asked, and as he took a single step towards Buffy, she fired another arrow, almost reflexively. But she couldn’t kill him, couldn’t bring herself to watch the light drain from his eyes before he vanished into dust.
“I guess I’m feeling charitable. You stay away from me ,” she hissed. “Stay away from my friends . Or I will kill you.”
*
Willow was crying, counting to thirty through choked sobs as she pushed down on Miss Calendar’s chest.
Something was happening on the other side of the library, clattering and shouting as Buffy did her supergirl routine and kicked Angelus’ ass.
Willow thought that she should be allowed to get a few kicks in too, after everything that he’d put them all through for the past few weeks. He didn’t get to treat her best friend like that without feeling the wrath of Willow Rosenberg. And now Miss Calendar…Willow had to save her. She couldn’t stop Buffy from crying in the middle of the night when she thought that nobody was listening, when she mistook the slow breathing from Willow’s sleeping bag as snoring. Willow couldn’t dry her tears and make the pain of Angel’s betrayal go away. Buffy’s first love who should’ve been there to hold her whilst she cried…Willow wished she could do that for Buffy, but Buffy was determined to stay strong. At least in the light of day. Willow couldn't do anything for Buffy, but she could do her best for Miss Calendar. She couldn’t die.
She just couldn’t bear to go to school every day knowing that Miss Calendar wouldn’t be there, passing her in the halls and offering a friendly wave. She couldn’t go to computer science if Miss Calendar wouldn’t be the one standing at the front of the class, a strong cup of coffee in one hand, gesticulating wildly with the other as she explained their latest assignment.
She couldn’t go to the library knowing that Giles would be in there all alone. That he never got to reconcile with someone who meant so much to him.
Twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty…
Willow pinched Miss Calendar’s nostrils, inhaling deeply before bending down to fill her lungs with air.
One … two…
CPR was different when it wasn’t being performed on a plastic dummy in health class. It was different when it was someone Willow cared about so much that every breath hurt, when her tears were coming so fast that her vision was blurred as she tried to find the right spot to restart the count to thirty.
She couldn’t let Miss Calendar die. Not while Buffy was fighting so hard to keep Angel away…or Angelus. Willow wasn’t really sure what she was meant to call him; he wasn’t Buffy’s Angel, apparently, since losing his soul. But he wore his face, he had all of Angel’s memories…
He remembered how he’d helped them all for the past two years, remembered all of the time he spent at Buffy’s side…and still, he was hurting them all. He was hurting Buffy.
Well, emotionally, anyway. From what Willow could tell, Buffy was definitely winning this particular fight, and a humiliated Angelus wasn’t one that would stick around for further bashing.
Willow didn’t know how much time had passed between the beginning of her attempt to revive Miss Calendar and the moment that Buffy fell to her knees beside them.
*
“911, what’s your emergency?”
“We need an ambulance!” Willow demanded through choked sobs, too focused on keeping her voice steady to remember the phone etiquette rules that her mom had drilled into her. “We…we’re at Sunnydale High. Our teacher, she’s…she’s unconscious. We’ve tried CPR but she’s not waking up!”
“Is the patient breathing?”
Willow turned to Buffy, who was watching Miss Calendar with wide eyes. It was a barely noticeable movement, but Willow could see Miss Calendar’s chest moving up and down slightly. Small, unsteady breaths, but still.
“Y-yes. She’s breathing, but…but she’s not doing well. She’s not waking up. Please , you have to hurry!” Willow begged, hot tears streaming from her eyes.
She’d never had to call an ambulance before, she’d never done CPR before. If anything went wrong…how could she explain to Giles that they’d been too late? That they’d done their best but it was all for nothing because Miss Calendar never woke up.
“An ambulance is on its way, okay? Is there an adult with you?”
“No,” Willow replied, suddenly feeling horribly small. “No, it’s just me and my friend, we- we were just studying late and- and we heard something happening in the library, and–” Willow interrupted herself. The more she tried to explain exactly why she and Buffy were in the library so late, the more questions that would be asked, and the more they’d have to explain about Angel. About why he’d gone after Jenny. It all got a little too close to ‘revealing slayer business’ territory. “ Please just hurry up!” Willow repeated.
There was nothing they could do to make the ambulance come faster. They could ask Willow for their names, explain how to put Miss Calendar into recovery position. Willow was sure that she made Miss Calendar’s twisted arm even worse when she folded it over her chest.
They could tell Willow to just hang on.
She stayed on the line, entangled with Buffy as they crouched beside Miss Calendar, clasping onto one another.
The ambulance came less than five minutes later, and Willow could only watch as a pair of total strangers took matters into their own hands.
They told Willow and Buffy that they’d done a wonderful job, that they’d probably saved her life. They let them ride in the back of the ambulance, they didn’t ask any uncomfortable and unanswerable questions.
Willow wouldn’t have answered any of them anyway. She and Buffy could only stare. They could only hold one another.
*
“Buffy?” Willow spoke with uncertainty, introducing a new sound to the quiet of Miss Calendar’s hospital room. It made a nice change from the steady beeping of the machine that their teacher was hooked up to.
“Yeah?” Buffy replied, suppressing a yawn. It had been a long day, and was sure to be an even longer night. Luckily, she was used to not getting much sleep most nights.
“Do you…do you think that you could call Giles?” she asked, staring at her hands. “Someone has to tell him.”
Buffy nodded. She wanted to ask why it had to be her , why she had to be the responsible one to make the big, scary phone call. Why did she have to call Giles and explain what had happened?
Why did Buffy always have to be the grown up?
Okay…that wasn’t exactly fair. Willow had done a lot of pretty serious stuff back there; she’d given Miss Calendar CPR, she’d called the ambulance…but Buffy was totally drained from her encounter with Angelus. She hadn’t expected that for her Tuesday night; she thought she had at least a few days to recharge and regain her strength before she encountered him again. But he still found a way. He found a way to shatter that sense of security, to raise the stakes and remind them all what he was really capable of.
But still. Buffy had to be the grown up. She was sick and tired of always being the grown up, but such was the life of a slayer, she guessed.
“Sure thing,” she replied with a wobbly attempt at a smile. “I’ll be right back.”
Willow nodded, reaching across to hastily squeeze Buffy’s hand. “I’ll watch her.”
“You’re doing a pretty good job so far.”
“I try.” Willow paused. “Can you bring some snacks? She might be hungry when she wakes up.”
Buffy attempted to shift her face into a bemused expression – or at least the closest that she could get. “You sure you don’t just want to trick me into buying you snacks?” she asked, testing out this thing called ‘humour’ that usually helped people to feel a bit more normal in these situations.
“You got me,” Willow said quietly, managing a watery smile. “Bring the good stuff – I’ll pay you back.”
“Liar.”
“Probably.”
The phone was free, and Buffy felt a little guilty that she was disappointed.
She just needed a little bit of time to script the phone call in her head, to decide exactly what she was going to and to consider every single possible thing that Giles could ask or say in response to her carefully crafted explanations.
She didn’t have to go into specifics. She didn’t have to, like, freak him out about it. He could be kept in the dark for a little while, and by the time he arrived, Jenny would’ve improved so much that she’d never even have to make him worry!
It freaked her out to see Giles experience human emotions like worry and fear. It reminded her that he wasn’t a fully formed, self assured type of person. It reminded her that he was just a person. A person like her who made mistakes and felt pain and cried and laughed and loved and hated. He wasn’t just the emotionally constipated two dimensionally intelligent watcher guy that she thought she knew when she first met him.
A pit opened in her stomach as she dialled his number.
The phone rang for a few seconds before a slightly out of breath sounding Giles picked up. Buffy could hear the smile in his voice as he said, “Jenny?”
Her heart dropped like a stone. He must’ve been expecting to hear from her after she finished work; he sounded so sure that it would be her.
“Nope, it’s Buffy,” she replied, an attempt at lightheartedness.
She tried not to feel too offended by the way that the disappointment showed in his voice. “Ah, hello Buffy. Is everything alright?”
This was fine. It would be fine. “Uh,” Buffy started, twirling the phone cord between her fingers, “yeah! We’re all good here. Just…I just thought I’d let you know that we’re in the hospital with Miss Calendar, and–”
“What?” Giles cut her off, immediately anxious. “Is she alright?”
“ Totally!” Buffy lied, her voice slightly too high-pitched for her answer to be believed. Giles probably picked up on it immediately. “She’s totally fine! Just a broken arm, standard hospital visit stuff.”
“And how did you end up there with her?”
Good question. A very fair question, too. “Well…well, you know.”
“No, Buffy, ” he replied. “I’m not sure that I do.”
“Well, she uh…she called me! She– she slipped, landed on her arm, and she called me to come help her because…”
Not even Buffy could come up with a reason that Miss Calendar would call her if she slipped and broke her arm. Buffy didn’t have a car, for one thing. Not to mention the fact that she was seventeen years old and not even one of Miss Calendar’s students.
Obviously she would’ve called Giles. Scratch that – she would’ve walked herself to the hospital to get herself checked out, and wouldn’t have even mentioned it until someone asked about the cast.
“Buffy,” Giles said carefully after a few seconds of silence. “What’s happened?”
“I told you.”
“Have you told me everything ? ”
Buffy shrugged, even though he couldn’t see. “More or less.” She paused. “Mostly less.”
There was a shuffling sound on the other end, and Buffy bit her lip nervously, breaking the skin.
“I need you to tell me what has happened, Buffy,” he said with urgency. “Exactly what has happened, ” he specified.
Buffy usually had zero qualms with stretching the truth but, well, time and place. He’d find out eventually. He’d leave the house as soon as their call ended. He’d arrive at the hospital and find Miss Calendar unconscious and bruised, unprepared and unaware of what had happened.
Honesty time.
“It was Angelus,” Buffy murmured, hyper aware of the nurses and hospital visitors passing by, wary that someone might be listening in. “Jenny…she was working late, I guess. I’m not totally clear on the details, but it has something to do with Angelus.”
“She did say…she had something to tell me, she was– we were–” Giles’ voice was fading in and out as he searched for words. He sounded dazed. He must’ve picked up on the fact that what Buffy was describing was a little more than a broken arm.
As she explained, Giles was silent. Dead silent, and for lack of being able to see his facial expression, Buffy was nervous.
“Giles?” she spoke, checking that he was still there. “Please say something.”
Another moment of silence fell between them until, after a few tense seconds, Giles cleared his throat before saying, shakily, “Thank you, Buffy.”
“Huh?”
“Thank you for being there, I don’t– thank you. I'll be there as quickly as I can.”
It seemed like such a…such a nothing response. Like he should've said more . She expected him to be angrier, for him to swear that he'd let loose on Angelus, get all ‘Ripper-style’ with it. But he was in full Watcher-mode. It was pretty disconcerting.
“Are you okay, Giles?” Buffy checked. Maybe he was in a state of shock, or something.
“You needn't worry about me, Buffy. Just…just go and sit with Willow and Jenny, alright? I shan't be long.”
“You're acting like…”
Like nothing had happened? Like a responsible adult? Like a parent trying to pretend that everything was totally peachy so the kids didn't freak out? They were the scoobies - their lives were one big total freak out. Giles deserved to freak out about this, she thought.
“How are you being so cool about this? I-I'm totally freaking out, honestly. I'm just trying to save face for Willow, but–”
“Then I suppose you understand why I am so ‘cool’ about this,” Giles replied gently, although Buffy didn't miss a slight crack of his voice that couldn't be blamed on the phone signal. “I’m…saving face, as you put it. And I'm not sure how long I'll be able to, so I'm going to hang up now, alright?”
“Okay.” Buffy's voice was small. “Hurry up - I don't want to be in charge anymore.”
Everything would feel more normal when Giles arrived, she was sure of it. She may have been the Slayer, but no matter how many demons she fought, she would never get used to the feeling of coming so close to losing someone close to the group. Such a familiar face almost snatched away by an even more familiar face.
She couldn't stay in the Big Brave Slayer role about this.
Buffy stayed there, frozen by the hospital phone for several quiet minutes after Giles hung up. She stayed, standing with the receiver gripped in a balled fist, staring at the floor until someone else came along to make a phone call.