She knew that, told herself that, even believed that.
But hope still reared its ugly head when she least expected it.
Now, as she stirred, she realized she had completely blown it by seeking out Angel. She didn’t feel any better. In fact, she felt worse. Not only had she violated her own rule about coming here, but she had probably kept her mother up worrying.
She crossed to the phone and dialed home. Her mom picked up on the first ring, and Buffy closed her eyes in shame at the tense, “Hello?” on the other end.
“Mom, it’s me. I couldn’t find her. I fell asleep at a . . . a friend’s.” She was about to say, at Willow’s, but she made herself stop. Why lie? Her mother had no doubt called the Rosenbergs already.
“Yes, Willow let me know. You were already conked by the time she got to the phone. But it was sweet of you to ask her to let me know where you were.”
“Oh,” Buffy said uncertainly. She’d have to thank Willow big time, although she was sorry Willow had voluntarily fibbed. Willow really didn’t like to lie. Plus, she was usually fairly bad at it, “I have to hurry. I’m already late for school.”
There was a pause. Then Joyce said, “Should I call the police and tell them what we saw, Buffy? I don’t know what to do. The Acuffs must be going crazy.”
“I know.” Buffy sighed. “Mom, trust me. Don’t call. It would only make it worse.”
“I suppose you’re right.” Her mother sounded frustrated. “I know you’re right. But it’s awful to know that she’s out there somewhere . . . in that condition.”
“Well, I’m hoping Giles can do something about it,” Buffy replied, glancing around the room for her Slayer’s bag and her sweatshirt. They had been carefully stowed beside the fireplace, her sweatshirt neatly folded and placed on top of the bag. “But if you try to explain it to people who don’t understand, it could slow him and me down, do you see what I mean?”
“Yes.” There was another pause. “I know this is old territory, honey. For both of us. It’s just so hard to stand by and do nothing.”
Buffy managed a faint smile. Her mom would have made a pretty awesome Slayer herself.
“Maybe whatever was wrong with Lindsey was a temporary thing,” Buffy suggested. “Maybe she’s her old self again. She fell asleep somewhere and she’ll wake up and she’ll get home.” And not end up in one of those hideous autopsy photos.
“You’re a good person, Buffy,” Joyce said.
Buffy’s eyes widened. “Huh?”
“To give me hope. That’s very sweet. Now, go get ready for school.”
They hung up. Buffy picked up her Slayer’s bag and went down the hall to wash up in the bathroom.
There was a cup of freshly brewed coffee waiting beside the bathtub. Also, a note from Angel which read: I’m awake if you want to talk.
Buffy carefully put the note aside and started undressing. Shower, she told herself firmly. Drink the coffee and go to school.
The steam rose around her as she stepped in and stood under the hot spray. She knew Angel would hear the shower running, and she felt self-conscious as she closed her eyes and raised her face, trying to wash her weariness away. Not that he would ever barge in on her.
There was a fresh bar of soap in the dish, and half-used bottles of shampoo and conditioner. As she washed her hair, bits and pieces of her nightmare returned to her, and despite the heat, she shivered.
She rinsed and turned off the shower, realizing only then she hadn’t checked to make sure there was a towel. There was one, freshly laundered, and hanging on the rack. He thought of everything.
She redressed in her sweats and T-top, wishing she had something else to change into.
When she was finished, she tiptoed back into the hall. Then she paused. Took a breath. Told herself firmly to move on.
Instead, she called softy, “Angel?”
There was no answer. Relief mingled with disappointment, and she moved on, to the living room. She collected her sweatshirt and let herself out.
In his bedroom, Angel lay with his eyes wide open and stared through the darkness. Buffy would never know how badly he had wanted to tell her to come in when she called his name.
But as soon as he had written her that note, he knew he wasn’t asking her if she wanted to talk.
He was telling her what he really wanted.
And that was something he could never have again.
So he kept silent, and let her think he was sleeping.
Greater love hath no vampire, he thought ironically. And even though he was tired down to his bones, he knew he would have no rest that day.
“So, anyway, now you know my deepest, darkest secret,” Cordelia said to Willow as she navigated wildly down the street. Mariah Carey was hip-hopping on Cordy’s CD player. They had stopped at the Espresso Pump for lattes and girl time, and it was all a little much for Willow, especially this early in the morning.
“Uh-huh,” Willow replied. “I must admit, I am a bit shocked. I would have never realized you knew where Sears was, much less that you actually bought a pair of shoes there.”
“Well, we all have things. I’m sure even you have things. I mean, things you consider to be things, besides the obvious ones.” Cordelia looked away from the road — which, given her driving, won’t make much difference, Willow reminded herself, so not to throttle up on the panic scale — and narrowed her eyes. “I told you something. So, dish.”
Willow chewed her lower lip. “Besides the lying to my parents almost constantly thing; and, well, stuff . . .” She trailed off. She knew that girls bonded by sharing secrets, but most of her secrets were about stuff Cordelia already knew. Like the Xander thing, and she sure didn’t want to go there.
Suddenly, sirens pierced the morning, screaming up a short distance behind the Cordymobile. Willow jumped at least a foot and turned around to see not one, but several police cars in a line behind them. The nearest one was practically ramming Cordelia’s bumper.
Cordelia only sighed and glanced into the rearview mirror. “What now?” she asked peevishly. “I swear, I’m always getting pulled over for nothing.”
“By an armada?” Willow asked in a squeaky voice.
“Whatever.” Which meant that Cordelia didn’t know what an armada was.
As she aimed the car for the right-hand curb, swerving to miss another car that was inconveniently parked in the same vicinity, the police cars whined past. They were followed by two ambulances and a fire truck.
“Wow,” Cordelia said. “What do you think’s going on?”
Willow caught her breath. “Cordelia, what if they were going to the school?”
They traded glances.
“That could happen here so easily,” Cordelia said.
Willow nodded.
Without another word, Cordelia peeled out and jammed it.
All Willow said the entire way was, “Faster.”
Xander.
Though she would rather die — really — than admit it, he was Cordelia’s first and only thought as she screeched to a halt in front of the police barricade at the intersection in front of the school. There were police cars everywhere, and more barreling over the curb and parking on the grass. Blue and red lights strobed on top of cars with doors left open. Uniformed people were talking to people in suits who were talking on phones and gesturing to each other. A big black van was parked next to the steps, and a guy in dark gray body armor climbed out of it. He was carrying a rifle, and as he turned to go into the main entrance, Cordelia read SWAT written in yellow letters across his back.
Rolling down her window for the approaching police officer, Cordelia cried, “What’s going on?”
“We’re asking all students not yet in the vicinity to go home,” the guy said. He had a bad sunburn that made him look like he had a rash.
“Well, we’re pretty much in the vicinity,” Cordelia retorted, trying to glance around him.
Willow leaned over and said, “Is there trouble?”
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Duh, Cordelia thought, but waited for the cop’s answer.
“We have it under control,” the policeman replied stiffly.
Cordelia smiled the smile that could drop a quarterback at fifty yards. She said, “Gee, I hope you put sunscreen on this morning. That’s a nasty burn.”
He blinked at Cordelia and touched his face. She poured it on, sparkling all over, and he softened a little. Yes, she thought, and waited.
Sometimes it was so easy.
“Some kid went postal,” the officer confided, dropping his voice. “Took out some school personnel. A couple students, at least. He’s holed up in the library. Hostage situation.”
Devon shut Oz’s van door and said, “Okay, dude, so.” He wasn’t smiling and he wasn’t pretending everything was good between them. He just looked at Oz as if the ball was in his court, and shrugged.
“Yeah.” Oz started his van and backed out of the lot, leaving Devon to head to his own car, parked behind Sunnydale Chiropractic.
He got onto Route 17 and cranked up his CD player. Eric Clapton. A righteous musician who had seen his share of sorrow.
Oz ran his hand through his red hair and adjusted his seat belt over his brown-and-green bowling shirt. He was not the happiest camper in the whole U.S.A. Yesterday, he and Devon had agreed to a run-through of a new song Oz had written for the Dingoes, scheduled for tonight’s practice. Then late last night, Devon called and asked if they could do it before school. Though not exactly a morning person, Oz had been cool with that.
He’d also been cool with the request to drive Devon to the chiropractor’s office where his mom worked so he could take her car for the day, because his was up on blocks. And dealing, too, with the fact that all this took much longer than he’d expected, and he was monumentally late for school.
Given the fact of his fame as the student with the highest SAT scores ever to repeat his senior year, missing more school was not in his best interests. Still, he had kept his poise.
Devon had pretty much blown off the song, complete with some harsh comments on the second verse, and still Oz had stayed on idle. There was a difference between being dissed personally and someone criticizing your work. He understood that.
But then Devon had launched into his “Yoko” riff on Willow, blaming her all over again for Oz’s fairly predictable absences from practices and the occasional gig. That was the real reason for the meeting, and that pissed Oz off. He felt ambushed; he was unprepared for the confrontation, even more so for the fact that the entire band was mad at him and yet no one had so much as given him a heads-up before this morning.
He thought he’d covered all this over six months before, with some vague confession about being enrolled in a “program.” At the time, Devon had been understanding in the extreme, so sympathetic, in fact, that Oz figured he might have some kind of dependency problem of his own. But evidently Devon figured half a year of rehab was enough.
“You need to get it together, dude,” Devon had insisted this morning. “Or you need to get out.”
The thing was, Oz didn’t exactly decide one day to become a werewolf. His cousin had bitten him, and lycanthropy was the gift that kept on giving. If you got bitten by a werewolf, you became one, too. And three nights out of every month, if you didn’t chain yourself inside a cage in the school library, you stood a good chance of killing someone or getting killed yourself.
But this was all very hush-hush. Like Buffy, he had a secret mojo identity. Only his had nothing to do with heroics. His had more to do with the call of the wild side.
It was awkward, and it made for problems. Okay, so, life. But for Devon to essentially lie to him to call him on the carpet, that was uncool in anybody’s book.
He checked the clock on the dash. Rate he was going, he’d make it to school by third period. Maybe Buffy would have detention, too. He smiled at that. It would be nice to have a one-on-one chat with her, see how she was doing. She was good people. She was a damn fine salsa dancer, too.
He reached down to scan the CD for “San Francisco Bay Blues,” rounding a corner as he did so. His finger hit pause instead of forward, so he was momentarily distracted from his driving.
That was why he saw the overturned car that was blocking the road just a little too late.
Buffy got to the high school at exactly the same time that the ambulances peeled out for the hospital.
Cordelia nearly ran her over, but at the last minute squealed angrily to a halt and waited just long enough for Buffy to throw herself into the passenger side.
“What happened?” Buffy cried. “What’s going on?”
“Well, Miss Slayer, you weren’t here, so Willow tried to do this glamorous thing and she went into the library and got shot,” Cordelia flung at her. “And Giles has a concussion and Xander —”
“Shot?” Buffy stared at her. “What are you talking about?”
Cordelia muttered, “Shut up. I need to concentrate on my driving. These ambulance guys really punch it.”
“Cordelia,” Buffy warned.
“Okay. Brian Dellasandro went nuts and shot half the school, and we waited for you to show, but he was killing all kinds of people. So Willow tried to make him think she was his cousin, Natalia, with magick. She went into the library to try to talk him out. Only it didn’t work, so he knocked out Giles and Xander, and then shot her. So then the SWAT guys shot Brian.”
She glanced at Buffy. ”Willow’s really bad, Buffy. She might die.”
And I didn’t show, Buffy thought miserably. Because I fell asleep at Angel’s.
At the hospital, Willow’s parents sat frozen in the waiting room, holding hands and barely acknowledging Buffy and Cordelia as they paced. No one would tell either of them anything. This was the time when being a relative or at least a legal adult paid off. Kids were basically ignored and told to wait. It wasn’t like some TV show, like 90210, where every sixteen-year-old practically ran corporate conglomerates without a shred of interference.
After an eon, Buffy’s mother rushed in, saw Buffy, and threw her arms around her.
“Thank God,” she said. “Thank God you’re all right.”
“Everybody but Willow is pretty much okay,“ Cordelia said. ”Concussions. Some kid with them was grazed, but he’ll live.”
For a moment, Buffy let herself sink against Joyce. This is all my fault. I as much as pulled the trigger. I may have killed my best friend.
“Mom, find out about Willow,” Buffy whispered.
Joyce gave Buffy a peck on the cheek and walked toward the nurses’ station.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again,” Cordelia murmured admiringly. “Your mom sure knows how to moisturize.”
Buffy silently watched her mom as she talked to a blond woman in a white coat. Nurse, doctor, manicurist, Buffy didn’t care, if the chart they were checking was Willow’s.
The woman said something to Joyce, and Joyce smiled briefly at Buffy. Buffy assumed that was good news until Joyce came back over and said, “She’s still in surgery.”
Buffy walked over to the Rosenbergs, who were huddled together like Leo and Kate in the freezing Atlantic. She waited until they acknowledged her, and then she cleared her throat and said hoarsely, “I don’t know if they told you, but Willow was a hero today. She went into the library to talk to Brian, and she didn’t have to. She was trying to save Xander and Mr. Giles.”
Willow’s father, Ira Rosenberg, kept holding his wife’s hands in his. He said, “If that school was a decent place, there would not have been a boy with a gun.”
“Ira,” Mrs. Rosenberg began, but then she burst into tears.
Buffy swallowed hard. There were times that Willow had kept her from going crazy from the pressure of being the Slayer. There were other times she and Willow could just be two girlfriends, talking about their boyfriends or lack of same.
“Your daughter,” she began, then ducked her head. She wasn’t used to talking about her feelings with adults. “
She’s the best.” She knew that was a weak tribute, but it was the best she could do.
She sat with her mother, who kept murmuring, “Thank God you’re all right.” Buffy felt sick.
I wasn’t there, she thought. I didn’t prevent this.
Hours dragged by. Finally a doctor came out to talk to the Rosenbergs, who disappeared through the emergency room double doors. Buffy’s heart thudded out of control as she waited for them to return.
After about twenty minutes, they did. Mrs. Rosenberg said to her, “Willow wants to speak to you.”
Buffy nodded and followed a nurse through the doors.
Willow looked small and helpless in the bed. Her red hair was a shock of color against her pale skin and nearly white lips.
The nurse whispered, “She lost a lot of blood. Don’t stay long. She’s tired.”
Buffy nodded and moved to the bed. She said quietly, “Will?”
Willow’s eyes slowly opened. Tears welled.
“Buffy, I couldn’t do it,” she murmured. “I screwed it up.”
“No, you did a great job.”
A tear slid down her cheek. “It really hurts.”
“I’ll tell the nurse.”
Willow grimaced. “Thanks. Great day you picked to be tardy.”
It was supposed to be a joke, but it cut Buffy to the core.
“I’m so sorry, Willow. You don’t know how sorry I am.”
But Willow had drifted back to sleep.
The nurse came in and said, “You really should go. She shouldn’t have so many visitors.”
“She said it hurts,” Buffy said.
“She has a morphine drip. I’ll ask the doctor if we can increase her dosage,” the nurse offered. She moved to look Willow over. Feeling helpless — worse, useless — Buffy left the room.
Instead of going back to the waiting room, she started peeking in rooms, searching for Giles and Xander. The place smelled like blood and vomit and disinfectant. They were smells Buffy was familiar with; when you were the Chosen One, you spent a good deal of time in hospitals.
And funeral homes.
After three rooms, she hit pay dirt, of a sort: Brian Dellasandro lay unconscious in a hospital bed, an astonishing number of machines hooked up to him. He looked really bad. Buffy realized that in all the chaos, no one had asked about him.