Dry Kind of Love
by Tanith
>> send feedback << - >> read feedback <<
author profile

Vampyr Dust Award:

---

~ Chapter 1 ~

Zoë Barnet runs up the stairs to the third floor laughing, her fingers feeling for the solidity of the walls for balance, leaving splotched fingerprints on the white paint. Roger Waxman races up behind her in a last feeble attempt to overtake her, but Zoë reaches the landing first and spins around to face him while he is still three steps away.

"Ha! Beat you!" She yells triumphantly, leaning back against the wall, a smug grin on her face.

Roger slumps up the last three steps. "Only because I forgot to take my socks off. I kept slipping."

"You're just slow." Zoë sticks out her tongue at him. She slides her back down the wall and lands with a thump on the floor, her legs splaying out in front of her. Roger plops down next to her.

"You just cheat," he says.

She whacks his arm playfully, and he whacks her back, but then stops, his gaze caught by the trap door in the ceiling above their heads, a two by two white square with a thin silver handle.

"What's up there?" Roger asks.

"Huh?" Zoë follows his outstretched finger. "Oh that? Just the attic." She turns to her friend, grinning. "When we moved in, my dad found a whole bunch of used bedpans up there."

Zoë is disappointed when the expected expression of disgust does not spread across her friend's features. Instead, Roger merely scrunches up his nose, inquisitively. "What are bedpans?" he asks.

Zoë finds herself grinning again. "Well, the guy who lived here before us, Mr. Drake, he was 103 when he died, and before that, he was really sick and couldn't get out of bed for anything, not even to go to the bathroom. So he had these special pants..."

"Ewww!" Roger makes a face. "Why did he keep them?"

Zoë shrugs. "I dunno. He was a weird old guy. When we moved in, there was also a bunch of handwritten notes tacked all over the place that said things like, 'This is the bookcase,' 'This is the pantry.' And there were like forty layers of linoleum on the kitchen floor. My dad spent over two days just scraping it up."

Roger is still fixated on the trap door. "So what's up there now?"

Zoë shrugs again. "Junk?"

A gleam appears in Roger's eyes. "You wanna check it out and see?"

She does not want to check it out and see. Dread settles in the pit of Zoë's stomach; at 12, she's still afraid of the attic and the basement, and after dark, even her closet seems sinister. But she will not allow herself to appear cowardly in front of Roger.

"Okay, sure," she says. "My mom keeps a stepladder in the kitchen. We can use that."

"We have to go back downstairs?" Roger whines.

Zoë rolls her eyes. "Well, you can see if you can reach the handle by standing on your tippy toes," she says sarcastically.

Roger sighs and pulls off his socks. "Fine, we'll get the ladder. But this time," he says, standing, "I'll beat you downstairs!" And he leaps off down the steps before Zoë has even had a chance to get up off the floor.

"Cheat!" she yells after him, but she trots down the steps anyway, still grinning.

~*~*~*~*~*~

The attic is small and musty, the roof of the house sloping in to make it barely more than a crawlspace. It smells, Zoë thinks, rather like cooked cabbage. She swings her flashlight in a slow arc around the room as Roger pulls himself up through the trap door behind her, his own flashlight clattering loudly against the splintered wood floor. Zoë is glad she remembered to put her shoes back on.

"There's really not much up here," she says to Roger, who has also begun to peer about with his flashlight. "See? Just a bunch of old boxes."

"Yes, but what's in them?" Roger says mysteriously.

"As I said before, probably junk."

"But we won't know before we check, will we?" Roger smiles wickedly and squats before a box. He holds the flashlight between his teeth and rips off the long brown strip of masking tape.

Zoë decides there's nothing better to do than to follow suit. She walks over to another box and pulls off the tape.

Roger has pulled a partially deflated basketball out of his box. He holds it up for Zoë to see. "Obviously a priceless family heirloom!" he says. He chucks the ball over his shoulder; it makes a sad fwump when it hits the floor. "And this!" Roger continues, struggling to lift a heavy, old typewriter. "A historical artifact of unspeakable value."

Zoë crinkles her nose at what she has pulled out of her box: a large ceramic horror, possibly the ugliest vase on the face of the earth. "I think that this is all nothing more than yard sale rejects."

She puts the vase back in her box and stands, shakily. The darkness is starting to get to her; she can feel the blackness that lives in the corners seeping closer, like smoke, like fog, ready to consume her the moment she drops her guard. "Let's go back downstairs," she says, trying to hide the pleading in her voice. "I'm hungry," she adds. It seems like a logical excuse.

Roger ignores her, clamoring to his feet and heading over to one of the corners of the room, where it's darkest. He shines his flashlight down on a large, black object. "Cool! Check this out!"

Zoë walks over slowly, clutching her flashlight. The skin on the back of her neck burns, pins and needles. "Hmm?" she says quietly.

"It looks like a treasure chest!" Roger says with enough enthusiasm for the both of them. The end of his flashlight goes into his mouth again. "Here, help me get this open."

Zoë fingers the small silver cross she has worn since she was a baby, her poker tell, her single nervous habit, but she kneels beside her friend anyway. The chest is huge and wooden with a large gold lock; it *does* look like a treasure chest. Roger is pulling on the lock ineffectually, so Zoë pushes his hand away, an expression of scorn plastered on her face to mask the fear.

"Not like that, silly," she says. She plucks a thin metal clip from her mane of wavy brown hair and inserts it into the lock. After only a couple of seconds of maneuvering, the lock clicks open. The expression of awe on Roger's face is enough to make Zoë smile for real.

"Where did you learn how to do that?"

Zoë shrugs nonchalantly. "My dad taught me."

Roger looks at her incredulously. "Your dad?" he starts to ask, but grows silent as, with a creak, Zoë forces back the lid of the trunk.

Zoë is half expecting the chest to emit a deep orange glow, like a mystical object in an Indiana Jones movie, and bask her and Roger in golden light. Either that, or a large swarm of bats. Instead, a small cloud of dust wafts ups and fills the air, leaving Roger coughing, and then disperses. And the contents of the trunk sit before them, in all their mundane glory.

"Aw, it's nothing but more junk," Roger laments. He gets up and moves to the other side of the attic, but Zoë stays on her knees and shifts through the trunk's contents. Her Nancy Drew-reading instincts tell her that no one, not even her over-protective and paranoid parents, would bother to lock a trunk entirely filled with old clothes, as this one appears to be.

Her hand stops moving as it comes across the somehow comforting texture of worn leather. She pushes away the other clothes and lifts out a long black leather duster. She holds it to her face and breathes in its scent, which reminds her of baseball gloves and cigarette smoke. Why would such a nice coat be stored away in the attic? Even if her parents don't want it any more, she could still wear it. She pictures herself walking down the street at night with this coat flapping behind her like a cape, and she grins. She would look so cool...

She has nearly made up her mind to bring the coat back downstairs with her when she hears a door slam from far away and her mother's voice calling, stretching up three flights of stairs and through the trap door into the attic.

"Zoë! Roger! I'm home! I brought lemonade!"

"Crap!" Zoë drops the coat and slams the trunk shut. "Hurry, we have to get downstairs! If she catches us up here I'll be in so much trouble!"

Roger doesn't argue; he is already halfway down the ladder. Zoë shimmies through the trap door after him, pulling it shut behind her. She tucks the stepladder into the corner of the playroom's closet; she'll have to sneak it back downstairs later when her mom is distracted.

Unlike now, since her mom seems pretty focused. Anne Barnet's feet are pounding up the stairs and she is calling Zoë's name, an edge of worry creeping into her voice. "Zoë? Where are you?"

Zoë darts down the steps and meets her mother on the second floor landing. Relief floods Anne's face.

"Sorry, mom," Zoë says. "I didn't hear you. Roger and I we're playing on the computer with the headphones on."

Roger appears on the stairs behind them. "Headphones," he says.

"You guys should get outside some," Anne says. "But if you want, I can give you some lemonade first."

"Lemonade sounds great, mom," Zoë says, grinning from the natural high that comes with getting away with something just barely. She and Anne and Roger walk down the last flight of stairs together, all three smiling broadly for their own private reasons.

Only later, after Roger has gone home, and Zoë's dad has returned from the library, and they have all eaten supper, and Zoë is staring at herself in the mirror as she brushes her teeth, does she realize that she never found out what was so special about the contents of the trunk that it should be padlocked. As she slips between the covers and her parents kiss her goodnight, Zoë vows to go back up to the attic soon, to face the darkness and find out the truth. Tomorrow, she thinks. The stepladder's still on the third floor; it would be fairly easy to sneak up there when no one's looking. Tomorrow she'll go back up there and she'll find out.

But tomorrow she and Sarah go swimming at the town pool, and then they meet Roger at the Ben Franklin and they end up at his house, where they gorge themselves on the penny candy they bought. And the summer days all fade into one another, and then school starts, and even though Zoë always means to go up to the attic and check, she never does.

Pretty soon, she forgets all about it.

---

~ Chapter 2 ~

The dream is always the same.

She wakes on a bed of cold, hard stone. She looks down at herself; she is clothed in a long dark dress, pale wrists and hands and ankles and feet jutting out from beyond the rich fabric. She drops off the stone platform onto the ground, and pads silently across the room, the edges of which shimmer and mist and remains out of sight. Still, she walks forward with purpose, rounding a corner and finding herself in a sterile white bathroom. She places her hands on either side of the porcelain sink, and looks up. The white tiled wall reflects back at her; the mirror is filled with empty white space, barren, with nothing in between the wall and the glass.

She has no reflection.

And with that realization, she wakes.

~*~*~*~*~*~

By now, Zoë is so used to the dream that it no longer bothers her. Much. It still makes her nervous if she thinks about it too long, but she has grown accustomed to not thinking about it, and so she doesn't. There is far too much else to think about anyway. Like APs. And finals. And colleges. And Roger...

Zoë sighs and rolls over in bed, smushing her hair down with the back of her pillow. It's unusually warm for a Vermont May, and Zoë shifts uncomfortably under her sheets, her bare legs breaking free to caress the cool breeze drifting in the open window. Last year this time, there was still snow on the ground. Global warming, she thinks. A sign of the coming apocalypse.

She glances over at the clock on the bedside table. The glowing red numbers read 3:55. Through the walls, Zoë can faintly hear her father snoring. She sighs; she knows she will get no more sleep tonight. Resigned, she reaches over and flicks on the lamp. By her bed is a worn copy of "Neverwhere." She flips it open to her favorite part and begins to read.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"You snore like a broken weed whacker," Zoë informs her father the next morning at breakfast.

William raises his eyes from the pages of The Burlington Free Press, and his glasses slip down the length of his nose. "Do I now?"

"I think it's more comparable to a rusty chainsaw, actually," Anne says. She leans against the island and spoons a cluster of Fruit Loops into her mouth. Sometimes she eats at the table with William and Zoë, but mostly she prefers to stand. The entire family is always alive with nervous energy; none of them can stay seated for long. Zoë has been teased more than once about how much her dad paces when he teaches.

The teasing is clearly the biggest disadvantage to having both of one's parents be teachers. And one at each school, too, Zoë has often thought ruefully, so there's no escaping. When she was in elementary school, Zoë was purposely not placed in her mom's kindergarten class, but once in high school, it was inevitable that she would have to take one of her dad's classes. There was only one 11th grade AP English class. Zoë wanted to take it. William taught it. End of story.

"I'll try not to embarrass you too much, luv," he had told her when the counselor had given her the news. "And likewise, you'll do the same for me."

He had smiled at her and she had smiled back. "Does put me at a disadvantage, though," she had told him. "Means I can't write any revealing stories about my family."

"I might specially request those."

Zoë smiles at the memory. "I think I feel my next reflective piece coming on," she says. "'My Dad, The Human Outboard Motor.'"

"That's funny," William says, flipping the page of his newspaper casually. "I think I feel some creative grading coming on, too." He mimes drawing a big fat "F" on an imaginary paper in the air.

Anne laughs, and plops her bowl down in the sink. As she turns on the faucet, she checks her wristwatch. "Uh oh, folks, we're all going to be late again."

"You know what's not fair?" Zoë grumbles as she swings her backpack up onto her shoulder. "We might all be late, but I'm the only one who gets detention."

"Life's not fair, pet," William says, reaching over his daughter to snag a last sip of tea. "But at least you never have to worry about getting a ride to school."

That was true, Zoë decided as she headed out the door. So there was at least one advantage to having both her parents be teachers.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Cafeterias tend to be loud and hot and soaked with the stench of burning grease, and Middlebury Union High School's cafeteria is no exception. The cafeteria is as old as the school, dating back to the early 1950s, and the only updates it has been given since then is a new layer of linoleum on the floor and four new drinking fountains. Zoë sits in the corner near the only one of the four that is still working, cutting her slice of pizza into pieces with a plastic knife and fork. It's too slimy to eat any other way.

"I think they're trying to kill us," Roger says, finishing the last bite of his plate-size chocolate chip cookie. He holds the plate itself up in front of his face; the grease from the cookie has turned the white paper murky gray and left it nearly transparent. "I mean, I can practically see through this thing."

Sarah makes her patented "eww" face at Roger. "And that is precisely why I bring my *own* lunch," she says, taking a large bite of her homemade sandwich and gloating at her companions.

Zoë takes a thoughtful sip of Country Time lemonade. "You know," she says, "once, when my uncle Alex was visiting, he started telling me this gonzo story about how his high school cafeteria lady tried to put rat poison in the Jell-O, but then my mom gave him The Look and he shut up."

"You don't mess with the lady when she's got The Look," Roger confirms.

"But you don't think it's really true, do you?" Sarah asks, scrunching up her nose. "About the cafeteria lady and the Jell-O?"

Zoë considers for a moment before answering. "No. Uncle Alex is full of it. He used to try to pull quarters out of my ear and all that crap." She pushes the plate of half-eaten pizza away. "I can't take any more of this. It tastes like burnt rubber." She stands and walks over to the garbage can and starts to scrape off her tray. "Can you believe my dad actually likes this stuff?" she asks over her shoulder.

"Maybe compared to the food in England it's really good," Roger suggests.

"Then I pity the British."

"I don't pity them a bit," Sarah says, as she rises to dispose of the remnants of her lunch. "Least not the women. They've got themselves a whole country full of men who talk like your dad." Her eyes grow misty.

"Sarah!" Zoë stares at her friend, aghast. "That's disgusting! Stop it!"

"I'm only kidding," Sarah says, recovering slightly. But her cheeks are still so red that she has to turn away.

Roger is watching them from the table, an expression of barely contained laughter smothering his face. Zoë sits back down across from him, her head in her hands.

"God. It's bad enough to have Kelly and Emily and their minions, all of whom otherwise hate me, trying to get placed in my group for projects just so that they can come over to my house and make up lame excuses to repeatedly go into his study. And then it's like," she pitches her voice higher to mimic the Kelly and Emily minions, "'Oh, hi, Mr. Barnet! I think I left a book in here, let me bend over in my skanky top right in front of you and pretend to look for it!'" She fixes Sarah with a steely gaze. "I really don't need that from you, too."

Sarah sits down next to her friend but still doesn't look at her. "Jeeze, sorry."

"Oh, come on, Zoë!" Roger suppresses his laughter long enough to say. "It's not as if your dad sees it as anything other than ridiculous. Besides, he's so into your mom it's scary." He leans in low over the table, grinning. "Remember that time on the camping trip when we caught them--"

Zoë slams her hands over her ears and starts humming, loudly. "I'm not listening to this!" she yells between bars of 'I've Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts'. "Must we bring up everything that makes me want to hurl?"

"Well, we could talk about the food again..." Sarah says.

"Arrgh! That's it! I'm going to class!" Zoë says and storms away.

Roger and Sarah look at each other for a moment before going after her. Roger reaches her first and taps her on the shoulder.

"Er," he says. "We all have class together. Remember? It's called AP English, your dad teaches it, Kelly and Emily sit up front and bat their eyelashes at him...sound familiar?"

Zoë freezes in her tracks, her shoulders tense. Then she spins around and kisses Roger hard on the lips.

"I hate you," she says as the kiss breaks. She turns on here heel and walks the rest of the way to class, smiling in spite of herself.

Sarah approaches Roger who is standing completely still, grinning like an idiot.

"You're grinning like an idiot," she tells him.

Roger just watches Zoë's retreating form, still smiling. "We should really fight more often."

---

~ Chapter 3 ~

Being in her father's class is far from easy for Zoë, even if she were able to ignore the Kelly and Emily factor. Because she has to deal with William both at school and at home, if she misbehaves, it will come back on her double. Furthermore, he refuses to let his daughter off easy, perhaps holding her to an even higher standard than the rest of his students. And worst of all, even after eight months, she still slips sometimes and calls him dad instead of Mr. Barnet. Kelly and Emily just love that.

And today is shaping up to be one of the less good days. As she enters the classroom, still flushed from kissing Roger, William rises from his desk - around which Kelly and Emily are huddling, Zoë notices with displeasure - and approaches her.

"You're ready for your presentation, right luv?" he asks, looking at her over the rim of his glasses. Behind her, Kelly and Emily laugh giddily.

"Of course," Zoë lies, while her mind screams, what presentation? And then it comes back to her: she was to pick a poem and analyze it, and then present the poem and the analysis to the class. Only somehow, she forgot. *Why can't you remind me of these things when there's still something I can do about it?* she thinks. "It's not like I need you to remind me of these things," she says.

"Of course not." William walks back over to his desk, over which Kelly is now leaning, exposing her breasts suggestively. "Girls," he says, through slightly clenched teeth, "why don't you both take your seats?"

Zoë takes her seat as well, desperately trying to recall any poem she might have accidentally memorized, as she accidentally memorizes everything from song lyrics to TV commercials, and decide whether she can use it. "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"? No, too obvious. This was Vermont, for Christ's sake, half the class probably chose to do Robert Frost. "Hanging Fire"? Did she actually have all of that memorized?

She is interrupted from her reverie by the arrival of Roger and Sarah. Roger smiles at her, uncharacteristically shy, and sits at his assigned desk across the room from her. Even though they had been going out officially for over two months, it was still weird for both of them, and perhaps weirder still for Sarah. She takes her seat next to Zoë, an unreadable expression on her face.

"My, if it isn't PDA girl," she says, not unkindly.

"My, if it isn't British accent fetish girl," Zoë replies, a bit too loudly. Sarah looks up at William, mortified, but he is writing on the wipe board and not paying any attention. But then Zoë turns to her friend and says, much more quietly, "Did you remember to prepare your presentation?"

"Crap!" Sarah swears under her breath. "Tell me yours is all ready."

"It will be."

Sarah bangs her head on the desk. "Great." The first bell rings and the rest of the class begins shuffling in. "Why does your dad have to do everything in alphabetical order? And why do we have to be B's? Why should Roger have all the luck?" She sticks her tongue out at Roger, who gives her a strange look from his place across the room. "You don't deserve to be a W!" she yells.

"Shut up, Sarah," Zoë says, and is pleased when her friend complies, even though it had more to do with the fact that William looked over his shoulder and arched his eyebrow at her. "I'm trying to concentrate."

The second bell rings and William turns to face the class. He leans against the old wood lectern on which his attendance book is spread and speaks to the students as he checks off their names. "First the good news. We only have to deal with each other for another 43 days and then we're all free for the whole summer." Several people cheer. William grins. "Believe me, you lot are nowhere near as happy as I am. But sadly, we have the inevitable bad news to contend with as well. Starting Monday, we enter AP prep hell. So prepare yourselves for cramming and that weird buzz you get from too much pizza and Dr. Pepper." He takes off his glasses and fixes the class with a cold stare that Zoë is sure he must think of as intimidating. "And study your vocab words! Honestly, they really do help."

The glasses go back on and Zoë can feel William about to shift subjects. Talk more about the vocab, she prays.

"And now we're going to start our poetry presentations," William says. Since Avery's conspicuously absent, we'll begin with Zoë."

"Take a really long time!" Sarah whispers as Zoë rises from her seat. Zoë shoots her a dirty look and takes her place at the front of the class. She looks at her father, back behind his desk and watching her expectantly. Then she takes a deep breath, and begins to recite.

"Death is before me today
Like the recovery of a sick man
Like going forth into a garden after sickness

Death is before me today
Like the odor of myrrh
Like sitting under a sail in a good wind

Death is before me today
Like the course of a stream
Like the return of a man from the war galley to his house

Death is before me today
Like the home a man longs to see
After years spent as a captive"

Once she finishes, Zoë stands dumbly for a second. Most of her classmates are either staring at her with glazed-over eyes, or ignoring her all together. Roger is still smiling at her rather shyly, and Sarah mouths, "Good cover!" when she looks her way. Her father sits silently in the back of the room, a small twist of a smile playing on the corner of his mouth. She finds she cannot read the expression at all. Just open your mouth and start analyzing, she thinks. So she does.

"Um, there have been many poems written about death, but what made me choose this one is the fact that it presents death in a totally different manner than most. To most people and poets - not to imply that they are two separate groups," she adds, and she watches as her dad's odd little half smile grows, "death is regarded as the inevitable end to the wondrous journey that is life; it is viewed as something to dread, something to attempt to avoid, even though one cannot. For most, death is the ultimate enemy."

She pauses, partially for effect, and partially to gain a moment to figure out where she is going to go next. Rhetorical devices, she thinks. Now is the time to start blathering on about metaphors.

"But not in this poem," Zoë continues. "This poem is essentially a group of similes - 'death is like the recovery of a sick man,' 'death is like the course of a stream' - that make up the underlying metaphor: death is the natural end to life, death is the rest and relief one finally achieves at the end of their journey. It seems that the poet is almost anticipating his death, because he longs for release. It is an interesting and not often explored point of view."

Again, she pauses. Just keep going, she thinks. You're almost there, almost there!

"Er, other elements of the poem, such as the structure, seem less important to me. While the stanzas and lines are all approximately the same length, this does not strike me as a particularly conscious choice on the part of the poet. Of course, in poetry, the selection of almost every word involves conscious choice," again, William favors her with an odd smile, and she wonders what was so funny about what she said, "but this element still does not have much to do with the meaning or power of the poem in my opinion.

"Elements of the tone, however, do. This poem uses very simple, sparse language, quite intentionally. It has a very soft tone, and when I read it, it calls to my mind the image of a man on his deathbed, explaining, in a whisper to the loved ones around him, why he is not afraid of his approaching death. The tone speaks so strongly of bravery and acceptance in the face of the terrifying unknown and usually unacceptable that it really serves to strengthen the poem's metaphor. The tone enables the poet's unconventional ideas to be expressed with a sense of truth."

*Home stretch!* she thinks, and finishes off in a last rush of air.

"I chose this poem because, using all the things discussed previously, the poet has been able to convey a message I have often sought to convey, only without sounding so cynical. Death is nothing to dread anymore than one dreads the sunset and the coming of the new day. Instead, it is the natural end to the journey we have all begun, and all one day must finish."

She moves unceremoniously back to her seat, and the class applauds without enthusiasm. William nods to himself. "Very good," he says, the greatest praise he'll ever give to any student while the rest of the class is present. "Sarah, you're up."

Sarah gets slowly to her feet. "You could have talked slower!" she whispers to Zoë before trudging to the front of the room. She clears her throat. "Uh..." she says. "'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,' by Robert Frost."

---

~ Chapter 4 ~

After class, Zoë and her friends hang around the room while William collects his papers so they can get a ride. Zoë is the only one who lives in town; Roger had moved to Bristol when he was nine, and Sarah lives "off in the boonies," as she likes to put it, in Shoreham. Therefore, they often stay at Zoë's house after school until their parents can pick them up after work.

William slides the rest of his stuff into his black messenger bag, and throwing his jean jacket over his shoulder, heads for the door. "Come on, kiddies," he says, jovially. "We depart."

The others push past him as he turns to lock the door, and then they walk down the hall and out the side entrance to the parking lot. They clamor into William's old Cabrio, Zoë up front with her dad and Roger and Sarah in the back.

"Straight home, or stops?" William asks.

"Uh, I don't know about you," Roger says, "but I could really use a Coke."

Sarah nods. "Me, too."

"I hear an iced tea calling my name," Zoë, who is strictly anti-soda, admits.

"All right then. Beverage break." William pulls out of the parking lot, eerily emptied in just the few minutes they stayed behind so he could pack up. The sky has turned dark, rolling with deep, thick clouds, and as they leave the campus, it begins to rain, the little drops spattering messily on the windshield. William drives a couple of blocks to the Champlain Farms and parks in front of one of the gas pumps even though he isn't planning on getting any gas. The three teenagers pile out of the car and disappear into the dryness of the convenience store. William follows, not bothering to lock the car behind him.

Roger and Sarah both grab Cokes, but Sarah pauses with her hand still half in the freezer, looks down at herself critically, and selects a Diet Coke instead. Roger watches this disapprovingly, but doesn't say anything. Zoë scours the various brands of iced tea, grumbling, "Why must everything be sweetened or flavored?" before finally choosing the most basic kind she can find. All three return to the front of the store, beverages in hand, to find William standing at the counter, trying to order a Slurpee.

"We're all out of strawberry," the clerk is saying. Zoë recognizes him from school: his name is Arnold, and he likes to yell, "Run, Zoë, run!" at her when she speeds down the hall in fear of being late for class. She hates him.

"Well, how about raspberry?" William asks patiently. Zoë can see that his patience is waning, however. His fingers are gripping the counter so hard that his knuckled have turned white. They must have been at this for a while.

"We're out of that, too," Arnold says, sounding bored.

"So you're out of lemon, blueberry, strawberry, and raspberry." William grits his teeth. "What flavors do you have?"

Arnold shrugs, picking an issue of "Guns and Ammo" back up off the counter and leafing through it.

William sighs. "Look," he says, "just give me whatever you have, okay?" He hands Arnold some money, and the clerk turns reluctantly to the Slurpee machine and begins to do his job.

"Wanker," William mutters as soon as Arnold's back is turned. Sarah giggles, sounding not unlike Kelly and Emily.

Arnold comes back with the Slurpee and slaps it down on the counter. Over Roger's protests, William pays for the rest of the drinks, and as he waits for Arnold to bring him his change, takes a sip of his Slurpee.

"This is strawberry," William says pointedly when Arnold returns with a fist full of grubby quarters.

Arnold shrugs again, the master of indifference. "I guess we weren't out after all."

"Right." William has his lip firmly between his teeth. "Well, have a nice day," he says as he walks out the door. Once outside, he adds, "You great bloody pillock."

Sarah giggles some more, and Zoë fixes her with a harsh stare. They all climb into the car again. William is still seething, but doing a good job to control it. "Charming lad," he says as he pulls his seatbelt across his chest. He starts the car and pulls out onto the street. "He goes to our school, doesn't he?" Zoë nods. "Pity he's not in my class so I could flunk him."

Roger laughs nervously. "Which is not something you'd ever do to anyone present, right?"

William turns around and smiles at Roger a little too broadly. "Just as long as no one present ever does anything to hurt my daughter."

They ride the rest of the way in companionable silence. Zoë's house is actually right across the river from the school, but due to the location of the town's only automobile bridge, William has to wind through the town to get there. He drives past the Middlebury Inn, whose big brick facade is always decked out in ostentatious holiday decorations, currently mother's day themed; around the curve of the town green with it's old white gazebo; past the Congregational Church, its tall spire scraping the clouds; and down Main Street. They drive by Dada, the housewares store where Zoë works on weekends, and cross the Battel Bridge to their side of town. The Barnets live on South Street, just off Main and a mere three blocks away from the library and movie theater. The street is lined with trees and big, old houses, all of which are painted white, save for the Barnet's three-story behemoth, which is bright yellow with blue trim. Their unconventional paint job got them a lot of hate mail when they first moved in.

William pulls his car into the driveway behind Anne's and puts it into park. Everyone spends a good minute heaving backpacks onto shoulders, and then they all stumble up the steps to the front porch, laughing because the inevitable has happened, and they are getting soaked. The big wood door is unlocked, but it is always unlocked. This is Vermont, after all - no one locks their doors. William pushes the door open with his shoulder and walks into a room of blood.

Blood on the floor, blood on the furniture, messages scrawled in blood on the walls. William falters for a moment, even though his first instinct tells him to get his daughter and her friends out of there. But his instant of shock and indecision is enough for the three teens to enter the room behind him. Zoë has the mail between her teeth, and it slips to the floor as her mouth falls open in an expression of mute horror.

Sarah murmurs, "Oh my God," before bursting into hysterical tears.

"I'll call the police," Roger sputters, reaching for his cell phone. His wrist is caught, mid-motion, in William's firm grasp.

"No," William says, his voice brittle. "No police."

Roger looks up at the man who holds his arm, a man who he has known almost his entire life, and who he has thought of as many things, but never as threatening. And for the first time, Roger is afraid.

William doesn't even look at him; his eyes are fixed on the writing on the wall. He realizes that the words to "Helter Skelter" are running through his head, but these are no song lyrics written here. COME HOME TO MUMMY. The letters still drip. I WANT MY SPIKE.

"Dad." Zoë's voice is barely audible, and her hand is fumbling about for his. "What does it mean, Dad?"

He swallows. "Nothing. It means nothing."

"Dad." He almost can't hear her anymore. "Where's mom?"

William shakes himself. "Zoë, Roger, Sarah, go next door to the Kieran's house and stay there until I come and get you. Don't talk to anyone."

"But they're in India," Zoë says. She sounds as if she has gone away.

"Use the key that they gave you so you could feed the dogs. Go! Now!"

They go, leaving him alone in a room he knows to be covered in his wife's blood.

The first thing he does is shut the door and lock it. Then he walks over to the piano and picks up the note he saw, just as he was meant to, when he first came in. He is relieved to see that it is not written in blood, but rather in pencil. In fact, the offending pencil is still resting by the note. It is one of Zoë's, with her name embossed on the side and her teeth marks covering the end, and William feels his small taste of relief drifting away. They could easily know about Zoë.

He forces his hands to stop shaking as he reads the note.

You have been running from us for a long time, but we grow weary of hide and seek. We've been watching for some time, just waiting for a cloudy day. She is ours now, as you are ours. Come home to us and maybe we'll let her live. Maybe we'll even let you keep her.

Come home. You can't hide what you are.

He crumples the note in his hand and tosses it to the floor. His eyes drift over the bloody mess that was his home, his gaze coming to rest on the big old mirror next to the piano. Anne found it at a junk shop when they first moved in, and she sponge painted the wooden border sage green to match the bookcases. William stares at his own reflection, at his mess of brown hair and lightly tanned skin and blue eyes hidden by wire rimmed glasses.

"Lies," he whispers. And then he walks slowly into the kitchen and fills a bucket with water and readies himself to scrub his wife's blood from the walls.

---

~ Chapter 5 ~

Zoë sits on the floor of the Keiran's living room, staring blankly at the wall in front of her. When they first came in, Roger had made a move to hold her, but she had pushed him away. Now he is comforting Sarah, who has nearly cried herself to sleep. She shudders occasionally, but then fades back into semi-consciousness. Zoë doesn't even want to look at her.

She is numb. My mother is dead, she thinks. My mother is dead, and my father... She doesn't want to follow that chain of thought to its end. And so she has allowed the numbness to take over her body, and her mind. She can feel the harness forming, but she doesn't even care.

The Keiran's black lab comes trotting over and nuzzles Zoë's shoulder, but she pushes the dog away. Sarah begins to cry again, softly, and Roger strokes her hair, murmuring unintelligible reassurances. Zoë stares at the wall and perfects the art of not thinking.

They wait.

After some indiscernible amount of time, William comes in the back door. His hair is wet and matted and his whole body is shaking. He has changed his shirt; the other one was soaked with blood and he didn't want his daughter to see. But the look in her eyes tells him that at this point, it is far too late for that.

"She's not dead," he tells her. He doesn't want to stir up any false hope, but he won't lie to his daughter any more. "I'm going to fix things."

Zoë's gaze does not leave the wall. "Liar," she says.

He opens his mouth, but he realizes that there is nothing he can possibly say.

"She's dead." Her voice is like ice. "There's nothing you can do to fix things. She's dead! Someone wrote messages on the walls with her blood." She looks up at him, finally, but her eyes are harsh, accusatory. "What did it mean, Dad? I saw your face when we came in. What did it mean?"

He kneels down beside her and takes her hand in his. From the corner, Roger and Sarah stare up at him with big eyes.

"I don't have time to tell you right now. But she's still alive, I swear it. And when I - when we - get back, I promise I'll tell you all about it." He looks down at the floor. "I - we - should have told you a long time ago."

He gets up, on rubber legs, and walks back to the door. "Stay here until I get back. Don't let anyone in, understand?"

Roger is the only one who nods.

William looks at the three forms in front of him; at the three children huddling wet and scared on the floor of a strange house. "This isn't right," he says sadly. "I'm sorry." And then he rushes over and hugs his daughter tightly, pressing her rigid form to his. "I love you," he tells her. "Know that. You and her are the best things that ever happened to me. After tonight, we're not going to run anymore." And then he walks out the door and into the coming night, determined to set things right.

William is not yet fifty yards out the door before Zoë is on her feet. "Get up," she says, a new edge to her voice. "We're going after him."

Sarah looks at her, and she wipes the tears from her eyes and stands. Roger rises behind her, his jaw set into a determined line.

"Lead on," he says.

They get out of the house just in time to see William round the corner and head Southwest on Main, away from town.

"Why isn't he taking the car?" Sarah asks.

"I don't know. Just follow him."

William walks purposely, his head down and his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. Zoë and her friends follow about a hundred yards behind, trying to be stealthy. The rain has slowed to a steady drip, but all four are already soaked to the bone, so it doesn't really matter. Zoë barely feels the rain. She doubts that William does, either.

Main Street turns into South Main, and William keeps walking, heading up the hill toward the college. Zoë notices that his shoulders are so still; he walks like he has stones in his pockets. It is so unlike him that Zoë comes to think that if she screamed, "We're following you!" he wouldn't notice. Still, she is cautious, and when William cuts across the college rec center's parking lot, she makes Roger and Sarah hold back until he is back on the sidewalk and partially hidden by trees. They run across the slick asphalt and top the rise just as William crosses the street and heads into the cemetery.

"Of course," Roger mumbles under his breath. "It would be the cemetery, wouldn't it?"

Zoë gives him an odd look. "What do you mean?"

"Nothing. Never mind."

She lets it drop.

The path through the cemetery is made of white stone, ground down at places to a thin chalky powder. It shines eerily in the light of the rising moon, like ice or snow, or large chunks of crystallized salt. It also crunches when they walk on it, so Zoë gestures for her friends to move off the path and onto the grass. They follow along, the wetness soaking through their sneakers and wrapping around their toes.

They crest a small hill, and the huge marble mausoleum at the back of the cemetery comes into view. Less than a year ago, on Halloween, the three of them walked here along a similar route and held a séance at the bottom of the mausoleum's steps. Nothing much happened: Sarah pretended to be possessed for a while, and Zoë knocked over one of the candles and started a very small fire in the grass that Roger stamped out with his foot. Then some drunken college students showed up, and with the cemetery becoming a less hospitable environment than they would have liked, they left, disappointed that not even a night at the cemetery could scare them anymore.

Tonight, they look on the mausoleum in an entirely different light.

"A mausoleum," Roger mutters. "Perfect."

But William does not approach the mausoleum; instead, he veers left, toward the bushes that form the western border of the cemetery. Zoë motions for her companions to hang back, and they watch from a distance as William ducks through the bushes and disappears from sight.

"And this whole cemetery/mausoleum thing held *what* purpose?" Sarah asks.

"A shortcut," Zoë says, realization slowly dawning. "Oh my god, I know where he's going." She races off after her father.

Sarah glances at Roger, confused. "Don't look at me, I'm just following her," Roger says, and he starts off after her with Sarah tight on his heels.

By the time they reach the hedges, Zoë has already passed through. Roger and Sarah push themselves through the tight weave of branches, emerging on the other side to smack right into Zoë.

"Ow," chorus Sarah and Roger.

Zoë ignores them, her eyes fixed on the old house at the top of the hill. "Look," she says, pointing, "there's a light on."

Their eyes follow her outstretched finger. Sure enough, a light flickers through the house's uppermost window.

"But no one's lived there in years," Sarah says.

As if on cue, a shadow passes across the lighted window.

"Oh." Sarah swallows, considering. "But I thought there was that whole problem with the asbestos, and that's why the college couldn't use it as a dorm."

"I doubt these people are from the college," Zoë says, still staring straight ahead. "I also doubt that they care about the asbestos."

"Don't worry," Roger says brightly, "it's probably just Norman Bates."

Sarah glares at him. She opens her mouth to say something, but Zoë holds up her hand.

"Shh. There's somebody on the porch."

A figure has emerged, moving quietly on the rotting wood. He pauses with his hand on the doorknob, his form barely visible in the light of the rising moon.

Sarah is the first to recognize him. "It's just your dad."

"I know."

William turns suddenly, his eyes darting behind him, scanning the shadows. Zoë sucks in her breath, but William's gaze shifts back to the door with him none the wiser. He pushes lightly on the door and it opens without a sound. He steps inside, shutting the door softly behind him.

Zoë stares up at the space where her father was a moment before. "Come on," she tells her friends, and they run up the drive to the house as true night falls about them.

---

~ Chapter 6 ~

Anne can feel the ropes cutting into her wrists. She can feel the gag growing moist between her spread jaws. She can also feel every one of the fine spider webs of cuts that trace her body, the tiny bites and nicks that they bled and then stopped before they took too much. They didn't even bother to drink from her. A sign, she knows, of disrespect.

She opens her eyes and sees nothing but white. So they've blindfolded her as well. She can't even get a look at her surroundings, see if there's anything she can use to facilitate an escape. She shifts her head around, hoping that the blindfold was placed sloppily and will be easy to dislodge. It remains firmly plastered to her skull. She barely restrains herself from letting out a growl of frustration, but she knows it is best to avoid attracting her captors' attention as long as possible. Best to remain quiet.

But quiet is bad. Quiet means thinking, and she has nothing to think about but her fear for William and Zoë, and nothing to feel but guilt. This is all her fault. She was careless and stupid. And now, after all this time, the past has finally caught up with them. And it was she who let it in the door.

She doesn't hear anyone approach, but suddenly there are cool hands on her cheeks and the blindfold is gently pulled away. William stares down at her, tears of relief in his deep blue eyes. He undoes the gag, whispering for her to remain quiet. "I'm here, luv," he says. "Everything is going to be all right."

He bends down and kisses her softly on the lips. She leans into him, and then with a sharp jerk, knees him swiftly in the stomach.

Drusilla falls backward onto the floor, clutching her wounded belly.

"Fool me once, shame on me," Anne spits. "Fool me twice, shame on you."

"It's the other way around, actually," Darla says, stepping out of the shadows. She grabs Anne's shoulder and slams her body back against the chair. "Shame on you for hurting Dru. She was just having a little fun, weren't you Dru?"

Drusilla has pulled herself to her feet. She stands far away from Anne, wary. "You stole my Spike away," she says, her voice bitter and sad. "Kept him locked in a box."

"That's right," Darla says. Her fingernails are digging into Anne's shoulder, leaving little red marks in the shape of half moons. "But everything must come out of its box eventually. Or it suffocates." She shoves the gag back into Anne's mouth and reties it, much tighter than before. "Dru, get some rope. We're going to have to tie her feet as well."

"Yes, Dru, get some rope. It seems we have a pair of stupid bints who need to be tied to the roof and left for the sun."

William is standing in the doorway, pure, unadulterated hate filling his eyes. Darla takes one look at him, and she throws her head back and laughs.

"Why, if it isn't William! My, I seem to have déjà vu all over again." She emits another peel of spiteful laughter. "Look, Dru. Your white knight has returned."

Dru looks at William, horror in her eyes. "That's not my Spike!" she cries. She backs away. "You're not my Spike!"

He glares at her. "You're right," he says. "I bloody well am not your Spike any longer." He rushes over to Anne, but Darla reaches out and snags his arm, jerking him away before he can reach his wife.

"Not so fast."

William doesn't even look at her; he just swings his free arm and punches her in the face. She barely staggers. Instead, she grabs the offending fist and crunches it within her own. William lets out a yelp of pain and struggles against her, but she holds both his hands now.

"You're not holding up your end of the bargain," Darla says, her face an inch away from William's. "We let her go when you let yourself go." She gives him a push and he sprawls on the floor. "We want Dru's Spike, not this pathetic specimen you've let yourself become."

William coughs, and a spurt of blood dribbles out of his mouth. "If you touch one hair on her head..."

Darla laughs again and walks over to Anne and slaps her across the face. Her head snaps back against the chair and she slips into unconsciousness. "We'll do all the touching we want," Darla says. "So you'd better hurry back." She turns away from William, no longer interested. "Dru, get the rope." She turns back and sees that William is still sitting on the floor. She smiles at him condescendingly and waves. "Don't you get it? Bye bye."

Her laughter follows him as he picks himself up and stumbles out the door, humiliation and sadness already drifting away to be replaced by anger. Anger, and he hopes, a plan.

---

~ Chapter 7 ~

Zoë presses her face up against the dirty window and tries to make sense of the dark shapes she sees inside. Old furniture? Nothing living, that's for sure.

"Do you see anything?" Sarah whispers.

Zoë takes a step back. "No. I think all the action's happening upstairs. We're going to have to go inside."

"Do you know where your dad went?"

"I'm right here."

All three teenagers jump. William is standing in the doorway, looking bruised and bloodied and tired. And angry.

"Dad, we - " Zoë starts to say.

"You followed me." Zoë nods, waiting for him to yell. Instead, he lets out a long sigh. "I'm not particularly surprised. Come on. We need to get out of here."

He steps off the porch and they follow behind him, Roger and Sarah hanging back, and Zoë running to catch up with her father.

"Dad," she says quietly, "is mom - "

"I'm working on it." His tone implies that that's all the information she's going to get.

She tries a different approach. "You're bleeding," she says.

He raises his right hand and rubs it across his face. It comes away red. "Oh?" he says. "I hadn't noticed."

The long drive, hidden in hedges, has ended, and they are back on the road in front of the cemetery. William turns and heads off in the direction of home, his walk very similar to the way it was on the way there, only now his head hangs even lower, and only his right hand gets shoved deep into his pocket. The left hangs uselessly at his side, more blood dripping from between the knuckles. He doesn't seem to notice, or care.

Zoë walks silently at his side. She has experienced so many conflicting emotions in the past couple of hours that she no longer knows what to think. Right now she is furious, and nearly all her rage is directed at her father. What right does he have to keep her in the dark? It's her life as much as his. And she is starting to think that more and more of her peaceful existence has been a lie.

"How come you and I never go to the doctor's?" she asks suddenly.

William stops in his tracks. Then he realizes that they have come to a halt right outside of the funeral parlor, and starts walking again, more quickly this time. "What do you mean?"

"Mom goes. Sarah and Roger go. Everyone else I know goes. How come you and I never go?"

"Good genes," William says decisively.

"Bullshit."

Zoë knows she's hit on something when he doesn't criticize her for swearing.

"I don't have time to talk about this now, okay luv?" is all he says, and he starts walking faster. She lets him get ahead, falling back to walk with Sarah and Roger.

"Have you guys noticed anything unusual about me?" she asks.

Her friends look taken aback. "Um, you mean apart from this night, right?" Roger says.

She just looks at him. "No," he says, a little too quickly. "I mean, you're not, like, normal, or anything, but that's why we like you. That's why I like you."

"Yeah," Sarah says. "You're not full of it like Kelly and Emily. You're not afraid to speak your mind. It's good-not-normal." She ventures a look over to her friend. Zoë's lips are pressed together into a thin line. "Why do you ask?"

She takes a deep breath. "Nothing," she says. "It's nothing."

No one speaks again until they are back at the Barnet's house. William walks in the front door, looking distracted, but the three teenagers hold back.

"Do you think...?" Sarah swallows. "Do you think *it's* still there?"

No one has to ask what *it* is.

"No," Zoë says after a moment. "I'm sure he cleaned it up."

Warily, they walk inside. The entry hall's walls sparkle; they are whiter, perhaps, than they have ever been before. For a moment, it's hard to believe that what they saw the last time they came in this door was real, and they all almost expect Anne to come running out of the kitchen, apologizing profusely because she's burned dinner, and offer them all some lemonade. But she doesn't. And it is all too real.

William starts up the stairs to the second floor, but stops at the landing. "Sarah? Roger? Call your folks and get them to pick you up. Then wait for them outside," he says, in a half-hearted attempt at being parental. "And don't tell them anything," he adds. "Go home and try to forget this whole thing ever happened." He turns and trudges up a few more steps, disappearing around the corner.

"Yeah, right," Sarah says as soon as he is gone, "like we could forget this."

"I'll call my mom and tell her I'm at your house," Roger says, indicating Sarah.

"And I'll call my mom and tell her I'm at your house," Sarah says, nodding at Roger.

"Are you sure, guys?" Zoë asks. She sounds like she has something stuck in her throat. "Because whatever this is, it's really, really bad. You should probably get out while you still can."

"Zoë, you sound like a bad movie," Roger says, grinning now. "I mean, come on, this is the most interesting thing that's happened to us in years."

There is a moment of dead silence, the calm before the storm. And then Zoë explodes.

"My mother is missing! She's probably *dead.* She and my father have almost certainly been lying to me for years. We came home this afternoon and the walls were covered in blood. He may have washed it away, but that does *not* mean it's disappeared. So...so fuck you and your 'This is interesting.' Just go home! I don't want you here!"

She storms out of the room. Sarah takes one look at Roger and runs after Zoë. "Wait..." she starts to say, but Zoë spins around, effectively cutting her off.

"You too!" she screams. "Just stop whining and get out of here! You can flirt with my father later, okay?" Zoë storms away, and this time Sarah doesn't follow her.

~*~*~*~*~*~

William stands in the upstairs bathroom, in front of the mirror, his hands firmly grasping the sides of the gray marble sink. He found the sink in the barn when they first moved in, and he'd installed it himself, but in the interim, he'd left it on the dining room floor and cracked it when he fell off a ladder and landed on it. He'd patched the crack, but it was still very visible. He stares at it now, to avoid looking into the glass.

Beside the tub rests a large brown trunk. It looks rather like a treasure chest.

William turns on the faucet and takes a sip of water. He checks his watch. Time's up. He pulls the plastic shower cap off his head, crumpling it up and tossing it away. He turns on the hot water and sticks his head under the spray, washing the excess bleach away. When he looks up at the mirror, his hair is bright, shocking white. He slicks it back with a handful of gel and steps back, not so much admiring as assessing his work, making sure he has done things properly. A feeling of dread has settled in the pit of his stomach. To say he isn't looking forward to what he is about to do would be an understatement. He'd rather impale himself on a bed of nails, drink hot oil, roll around on burning coals...but those are not options. This is his one and only option.

He walks over to the trunk and opens it. He digs through the clothes, finds what he is looking for, and changes into them. Then he removes the trunk's false bottom and pulls out a heavy, black metal box. He enters the combination and flips the box open. The inside is lined with thick, gray foam rubber, dividing the interior into two sections. The two sections contain identical black cubes, about two and a half inches long across each side. Each cube has a single black button in the center, and each is carefully labeled. William picks up the cube on the left, feeling its weight in his hand. Then he shuts the box and returns it to its secret place in the bottom of the trunk.

He walks back to where he was and stares at himself in the mirror. He runs his fingers along the sides of the cube. The plastic is cold to his touch. His whole body feels dipped in ice.

Slowly, he takes off his glasses and sets them on the side of the sink. He won't need them anymore.

His fist closes around the black cube. And then William takes a deep breath and pushes the button.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Sarah and Roger are sitting in the living room, staring at their hands, when they hear the scream.

It starts out low and deep, but it soon grows, becoming a high-pitched wail. Their heads snap up when they hear it. Zoë rushes into the room.

"What is it?" Sarah asks her.

"It's my dad," Zoë says instinctively.

She darts out of the room and up the stairs with Sarah and Roger close on her heels. The scream has turned frighteningly animalistic. They reach the second floor, and Zoë turns right, toward the bathroom. As they round the corner, Roger slips on his socks and falls to the floor. Sarah stops to help him up, and so Zoë is the first to reach the bathroom. She flings the door open, thankful that no one ever got around to buying locks. And then she sees what's on the floor.

From the neck down, it looks human. It wears black jeans, a tight black shirt, black Doc Martens, and a long black coat that looks strangely familiar. But the face...the face is not a human face. The thing on the floor looks up at her with golden eyes, it's fanged mouth open and screaming, it's ridged forehead creased in pain. And somehow, that face is strangely familiar as well.

Zoë is standing frozen in the doorway when her friends catch up with her. Sarah takes one look at the thing on the floor and screams. Roger stumbles backward, slipping on his socks, trying to pull Zoë with him. Zoë pushes him away. She takes two steps forward, crossing the threshold into the bathroom, kneels down next to the now silent, but trembling thing, and says softly, "Dad?"

His body convulses once more as another wave of pain hits, but her voice acts like an anchor that holds him to this world. With considerable effort, Spike shakes off his game face and pushes himself into a sitting position.

"Hi," he says weakly. He looks up at where Sarah and Roger stand, shaking and clutching at one another. His voice turns stern and parental. "I thought I told you two to go home."

Both Sarah and Roger look like they wish they had done as they were told. Roger swallows. "We thought," he starts to say, but has to stop and swallow again before continuing, "that we could stay and help."

Spike laughs then, in a very un-William-like manner. "Right, great. Scoobies, version 2.0." He stands and starts patting at his pockets, searching for something. Not surprisingly, he comes up empty handed. "Bugger. I could really use a fag." Off of Roger and Sarah's startled expressions, he adds, "Those are ciggies, kids."

He stretches his arms out, like a big cat waking up after a long nap. Then he stoops and offers Zoë a hand up. She takes it, but refuses to look at him. "You all right?" he asks.

There is a long pause, which Roger recognizes as the Storm-calm-before-the-storm pause, and he instinctively takes a step back. But Zoë does not yell. She merely grits her teeth and looks Spike directly in the eye. "You," she says levelly. "Are going. To tell us. Exactly. What is going on? Right. Now."

Spike opens his mouth to make some excuse, but something about Zoë's expression stops him. "Now," she says again, and he can't help but smile. He is so proud of her. And she deserves to know the truth.

"Right," he says, taking a deep breath and sitting himself down on the edge of the trunk. "Well, for starters, your mum and I didn't meet at a teacher's conference at the Sheraton..."

---

~ Chapter 8 ~

Spike paced back and forth across his crypt. He would pace until he reached a wall, and then he would turn around and pace in the opposite direction. He was surprised that he had not paced himself a rut in the floor by now. He hated waiting, and he hated the sodding sun for making him wait. But most of all, he hated how nervous he was.

I should not be nervous, he reasoned with himself. I've done this many times before - well, once anyway. And it's not like it's that big of a deal...

But it was a big deal, especially for Spike. After two years, he was still trying to prove - to Buffy, to the Scoobies, to the world, and most of all, to himself - that they could make it. That they could dance *this* dance, a dance that involved far fewer roundhouse kicks and cracked ribs and bloody noses, and far more touching and kissing, and, he thought, grinning, eventual shagging. And those bits he could handle - quite well, actually. It was the other bits he got hung up on: the boyfriend bits. Like picking out the perfect anniversary gift. He'd never had to do that before. With Dru he could just capture a nunnery for her to play with; but picking out a nice present for Buffy...that was hard.

Last year, he had spent hours at the mall - over several different days, because there was limited time between when the sunset and the shops closed - before picking out a rather expensive sweater that he thought she would like. She did like it; she even put it on over her dress and wore it home after their dinner. And so of course, they had to get attacked by slime spewing demons, and that was the end of the sweater. Spike was still bitter; he'd paid for that sweater with money he had *earned* (beating Xander at pool, but that was beside the point) and Buffy didn't even get to enjoy it.

He still worried that the "sweater incident" was meant as a metaphor for their relationship, a little cosmic hint from The Powers That Be.

He pushed that thought out of his mind as he took a moment's respite from pacing to make sure that the present he got her was still on top of the TV where he had left it, and that it hadn't mysteriously disappeared into the ether.

The present was still there, just as it had been the previous five times he had checked. He turned the package over in his hands. Inside, nestled in a cluster of pink tissue paper lay a small, brass, antique charm bracelet. Most of the charms were original - the ship, the Chinese bridge, the ballerina - but he'd added one of his own, as well. It was a tiny heart, pierced through the center with something that could quite easily be mistaken for a stake.

He thought it was a good gift. A little sappy, maybe, but still good. At least he'd stayed away from the "You slay me" card.

Looking up, Spike saw that the sun was beginning vanish behind the horizon. He shoved the present into the pocket of his coat and prepared to go out. This did not involve much because he had been ready for the past three hours.

"You are pathetic, mate," he said aloud. But he smiled as he said it.

Again, his eyes darted to the window. The sky was turning red as the sun dipped into the ocean. Almost time. He wished the bloody sun would just go about its business instead of feeling the need to put on this little show every night. It was like the stupid thing wanted to reassure the world that it was indeed coming back.

"Sod it," he said finally and opened the door and went outside, just daring the sun to try to dust him.

It wasn't true night yet, not for another half an hour at least, but it was dark enough. The sun meekly finished what it was doing and went away.

Spike walked slowly through the streets of Sunnydale, alternately worrying about the dinner reservations and planning the horrible things he would do to any sort of demon that so much as looked at them funny while they were on their date.

All violent thoughts ceased, however, the second that the Summers' house came into view. This part always made Spike especially nervous. He hated picking Buffy up at her house: it made him feel too boyfriend-y, like he ought to be wearing a tie. Spike drew the line at ties.

Hesitantly, Spike mounted the front steps and knocked on the door. He heard running footsteps and Dawn pulled open the door just as Spike mentally berated himself for not bringing flowers.

"Hey," Dawn said casually. "She's not ready yet. You can wait in here."

"Thanks, Nibblet," Spike said as he made his way into the living room and sat down on the couch. "Your hair looks really good. It's a nice look for you."

Dawn fingered her newly shorn locks self-consciously. "Thanks. I was just tired of the same old thing, you know?"

"Yeah. Every forty years or so, I get compelled to change my hair as well."

"You? Change your hair?" Dawn took a seat across from him. "That would be a shock."

He grinned. "Then I ought to do it soon, just to prove I can still shake you up."

"Oh? You're worried you're losing your touch?" Dawn teased.

"Nah, I still terrify half the population of Sunnydale. Just switched halves. Not a big deal."

"Right, not a big deal at all," Dawn agreed. But both knew exactly how big a deal it was.

They settled into a companionable silence, with Spike asking Dawn the occasional question about school, or her current boyfriend, or what it was like working for Anya. After a few minutes, they heard Buffy on the stairs and Spike got to his feet. Then she came into the room, and he wished he was still sitting down. She was wearing a deep red dress, the color of blood, he couldn't help but think. And she was smiling at him.

"Wow," he said. "You look...it's a great dress," he finished lamely.

"And you look just the same as always," she said, walking over and giving him a chaste kiss on the lips. And then she whispered in his ear, not quite so chastely, "And that's great."

"I can be more than great," he whispered back, pushing deeper into their embrace. She laughed lightly, and then broke off suddenly, kissing him again, more fervently this time.

"Guys," Dawn said, ahem-ing slightly. "It's great that you've still got passion and all, but can you save it for later? My poor innocent eyes!" She covered her face in mock horror, silently pleased that she could still use the not-in-front-of-the-virgin thing to get them out of the house, even though she had done far more with Dillon Warner just last week. But she stuck with what worked: Buffy and Spike were quickly, if reluctantly, putting polite distance between themselves.

"Right," Buffy said, smoothing her dress. "We'll be back...at some point. If you go out, just please, please bring a stake or something? I've always found that they make excellent fashion accessories."

Dawn rolled her eyes. "Buffy, please. I've been living on the Hellmouth for years. I know how to handle myself. Besides," Dawn added, becoming suddenly fascinated with her shoes, "I'm probably going to stay in tonight and veg."

Buffy nodded and made her way out the door. Spike paused on his way out, turning to Dawn. "He better be good to you, or I'll kill him," he whispered, "chip or no sodding chip." And then the door shut, and she was alone.

Within seconds, Dawn was at the back door, pulling it open and calling into the night. "Dillon," she said. "It's safe! They're gone!"

~*~*~*~*~*~

They walked down the drive and got into the Summers' SUV, with Buffy taking her place behind the wheel. She had finally cracked and got her license about a year ago, and now she insisted on driving everywhere. Spike didn't mind. He liked watching her flick her hair out of her eyes when she got frustrated and flip off the other drivers. Buffy was viscous when she drove.

Tonight, she seemed lost in thought as she buckled her seatbelt, but then she turned and smiled at him broadly. Spike got into the seat next to her and realized that his lack of patience had got the better of him: he wanted to give her his present right then. He fumbled around in his pocket and pulled out the gift.

"Look, luv," he said, "I was going to wait and give this to you while we were waiting for the wine or something, but I just...I want you to have it now." He leaned across the transmission and handed her the package.

She favored him with a little grin as she took the gift, turning it over in her hands. "What is it?" she asked, shaking it and looking very much like a child on Christmas Eve.

"Just open it," he said, hating himself for being so nervous over a present.

"Okay." She tore into the wrapping, shreds of pink tissue raining down over the seat. And then she saw the bracelet, and her breath caught in her throat.

"Do you like it?" he asked, anxiously.

"It's wonderful," she said softly. She looked up at him, her eyes brimming with tears. "Did you know I used to have one of these? When I was little. My mom gave it to me. I lost it, a long time ago."

Abruptly, she leaned over to kiss him, but was halted by the seatbelt, which she quickly shrugged off. "Damn automotive safety," she muttered, and then she did kiss him. Her hand, still holding the bracelet, moved up under his shirt. He clutched at her, his hand running through her hair. God, he never wanted this to end. But...

"Luv," he said, pulling away slightly, "I'm glad you like it, but if we keep this up, we're never going to get out of the driveway."

She gave him one last kiss, but then pulled back as well. Her hands tapped against her thighs, thoughtfully. "I want to take you somewhere," she said after a moment. She slipped the bracelet around her wrist and started the car.

"Where?" he asked, jolting backwards as she pulled out of the driveway. Quickly, he buckled his seatbelt. It was fun to watch her drive, but not necessarily safe.

"It's a surprise," she said.

"A surprise? But we have dinner reservations."

"You gave me my anniversary present, now I want to give you yours," she told him coyly.

He arched his eyebrow. "I'm liking the sound of this..."

She smiled at him again, and he was content with that until he saw that she was getting onto the freeway.

"Okay, this is too much. Just give me a hint. Where are we going?"

It took her a moment to answer. "La Jolla."

He stared at her, baffled. "La Jolla? What's in La Jolla?" She didn't say anything, she just smiled that little half-smile that was starting to make him very nervous. "You know that brings up more questions than it answers?"

"I know."

Spike stared out at the road for a minute, at the little red and white lights of humanity rushing by.

"A new pair of shoes or some t-shirts would have been fine," he said finally. "Or a new telly. Mine's gone all scraggly again."

"This is better."

"You know I don't deal well with suspense," he said. And then he had an idea, and he felt instantly better. "Oh, I get it," he said. "You're just doing this to torture me. You can't beat me up anymore without feeling guilty, so you figured -- OW!"

"I can so beat you up sans guilt," Buffy said as Spike rubbed his sore arm. "Keeping you in the dark is just extra special fun."

"Oh."

They rode on in silence for a while, with Buffy occasionally directing rude comments at her fellow drivers.

"I'm hungry," Spike whined after they had been driving for about an hour.

Buffy threw her head back and sighed. "You're such a baby!" she moaned. "You probably have to use the potty, too."

Spike chuckled. "Thankfully, no. I just haven't eaten all day. I was going to order a big, raw, bloody steak for dinner."

"Oooh..."

"What?"

"Now I'm hungry, too. Okay, we'll pull over."

And that was how Spike and Buffy ended up having their second anniversary dinner at a McDonald's just off the freeway, en route to La Jolla.

---

~ Chapter 9 ~

"Okay, we're in La Jolla now. Are you going to tell me what's going on?" Spike asked as Buffy pulled off the exit ramp and passed by the big "Welcome to La Jolla" sign.

Buffy sighed, suddenly serious. In front of her, the road forked, and she took the fork that led away from the town proper and toward the industrial district. "Riley contacted me about a month ago."

A look of pure horror crossed Spike's face before coming back and sticking there. "He *what?* Oh, god, we're not coming down here to meet him, are we? Because believe me, that is *not* what I wanted for our anniversary."

Buffy looked at him like he was insane. "No," she said, and Spike let out a gush of unneeded air. "But he would have liked that, I'm sure. He called to let me know that The Initiative had re-established itself down here, and that this is where I should bring you if I ever wanted to dispose of you in a less personal way." She looked up at Spike, who was looking whiter than usual. "I didn't tell him we were together."

"Right," Spike said, still trying to collect himself. "No need to add to the list of people who want to kill me. So, um, why are we here exactly? Did you think I'd get kicks out of sticking my tongue out at those Initiative ponces and saying 'Nyah nyah, look at me, it's Hostile 17, I haven't staked myself yet in shame?'"

"No, but you probably would."

"Damn straight. But seriously." He shifted around in the seat to face her. "Why are we here?"

Again, Buffy took a deep breath. Spike was beginning to think this was a bad sign. "About a week after Riley called me, I contacted an Initiative doctor to see what I could find out about your chip."

Spike's face fell. "You still don't trust me."

Buffy slammed on the brakes. Behind her, several horns honked. Sighing, she pulled off to the side of the road and put the car in park. "No. No, no." She turned to him and took his hand in hers. "I do trust you. I want to prove it to you." There was a pause during which Spike was sure he could hear the air vibrating around them. And then it ended as quickly as it had begun. "I called her because I wanted to see if she'd be willing to take it out."

Spike felt his mouth move, but no sound came out. "What?" he eventually managed to squeak.

"We're down here so that she can take the chip out."

Silence descended upon them again. Spike wished that his heart still pumped blood so that it could thud in his chest just to prove how worked up he was.

"I don't think that's a good idea, luv," he said finally. "I mean, I appreciate the sentiment and all, more than you could ever know, but..." He looked down at his hands. He remembered the things he had done with them. "It's great that you trust me this much, Buffy," he said, softly. "It's amazing; it's incredible; it's more than I could have ever asked for. And it's more than I deserve." He looked up at her again, met her eyes. "Because the fact remains, *I* don't trust me. If I got the chip out...I know I would never hurt you, or Dawn, or any of the Scoobies; but other people, strangers...I'm just not so sure. And I know that's not good enough for you. It shouldn't be good enough for you."

She thought about that for a moment before answering, but when she did, there was real hope in her voice. "That you would say that...that you have doubts...that seems to me to be the greatest evidence that you don't need the chip anymore. If you were really going to revert to your old ways, don't you think you'd be a bit more enthusiastic at the prospect of getting it out?" He started to protest, but she silenced him with a wave of her hand. "But that's not all this is, Spike," she said. "I love you. You make me happier than I've ever been. And mostly, you make me feel safe. But there's always this nagging question: what happens when the chip stops working? And so I need to know Spike. We both just need to know."

Spike shook his head. "We really don't. We could just go home and forget all about this. You can get me a new TV as a present instead," he added, hopefully. And then, more desperately, "We don't need to change anything."

She laid her warm hand on his cold cheek. "But don't you see? I don't think it will change anything. It'll just remove the doubt. I need that, Spike. I need that if I'm going to spend the rest of my life with you."

The significance of what she'd said sank in, and Spike gave silent thanks that he wasn't a total ponce, because if he were, he'd most certainly be in tears. As it was, he was fairly close.

"I love you so much," he said, cursing bucket seats as he leaned in to kiss her. "I'll do it. Of course I'll do it."

"Good," Buffy said when they broke away. She was sniffling a bit. She pulled the car back out onto the road and tried to make herself look more lighthearted than she felt. She couldn't let him know that she was scared. "Just think," she said, "Next time Xander pisses you off, you'll be able to smack him."

"Why didn't you just say that in the first place?" he said, plastering a cocky grin on his face. But he felt sick inside. "Buffy," he said as she turned off the main road and started down a long driveway, "if...if I can't control myself, I want you to - "

She cut him off. "Don't even say it. It's not going to happen. See?" She gestured to her determined expression. "Willow lent me her resolve face."

~*~*~*~*~*~

The driveway ended abruptly in a vast parking lot. Buffy slid the SUV easily into one of the places; the lot was nearly deserted, which made sense, considering that it was almost midnight. Spike opened the door of the car and jumped down onto the asphalt, feeling like he was going to upchuck the last two days worth of Big Macs and blooming onions and blood onto his shoes. He should not be reacting this way. He should be overjoyed; he should be doing back flips across the empty parking lot. Finally, he was going to be free. He was being let out of prison. So why did it feel like the walls were closing in on him?

"You okay?" Buffy asked, gently laying her hand on his arm. If she was at all nervous, she was hiding it very well. "You look deader than usual."

"'S nothing," he said, hoping to shake his anxiety away with a flick of his shoulders. "Just trying not to dwell on the fact that somebody's going to be cutting into my head before this night is over."

"We really need to do this," she said, her mouth tight.

"I know."

They followed the natural path out of the parking lot, toward the large concrete complex looming in the foreground. It was divided into two halves, separated in the middle by a courtyard that held a long, low reflecting pool. The whole complex sat at the edge of a steep cliff, beyond which the ocean stretched indefinitely into the night. The buildings themselves were luxurious in a cold, industrial sort of way, except for one jarring detail: they had no windows.

"The Initiative had this built special, then?" Spike asked.

Buffy shook her head. "No. It used to be a CDC building. You know, a bio lab thingy. My class actually took a field trip down here once."

"Sunnydale High took you to a Center for Disease Control? With that school's luck, I'm surprised the whole class didn't get Ebola."

She laughed. "Yeah, we probably would have. But this was back in elementary school. Pre-Sunnyhell and my night job."

Spike smiled at the thought of a pre-Slayer Buffy, wondering what she was like then. He voiced the question.

"Oh, I was a complete Valley Girl," she said, coloring slightly. "Like Cordelia times ten. You wouldn't have liked me."

No, I probably would have killed you, he thought bitterly. Out loud he said, "I'm sure I would have found something to like."

They walked for a few minutes, until they were standing in the courtyard at the edge of the reflecting pool, which was doing a very poor job reflecting Spike.

"Do you know where we're supposed to go?"

"She said she'd meet us here."

"Who's 'she'?"

"The doctor I spoke to. Her name's Miranda Peters."

"Are you sure she's not," Spike twirled his finger by his ear in the international symbol for mentally imbalanced, "batty?"

Buffy shrugged. "She sounded okay on the phone."

"Great, and you're letting this lady cut into my skull because 'she sounded okay on the phone'?"

Buffy looked at him like he was insane. "Of course not. I had Willow check her out."

"Red knows about this?" he asked, genuinely surprised. He figured that this was the kind of thing that would stay at the Slayer-Watcher level, at least until after the fact. "Not exactly..." And something in her voice made his anxiety blossom all over again.

"You didn't run this by anybody, did you? Not even Giles."

She shook her head. "No."

He sighed. "Buffy, can I say again that I think this is a very bad idea? At the very least, you're going to end up with a royally ticked off Watcher on your hands, and at worst..." He still couldn't bring himself to say it. He had to be the only convict who, with the prison gates in sight, was still trying to scramble back to the safety of his cell.

"It's going to be fine," she said, as much to reassure herself as to comfort him. "This is for us, anyway, not for them." She reached up and pulled him into a kiss.

"I see this reaches beyond the scientific applications we discussed on the phone," a cool voice from behind them said.

[next]
[to return to the archive, close this window]