Sunny Collins was trying to get her inter-library loan request done before dark. 
As always, the librarian was involved with his special group: Buffy Summers and her friends. 
Willow was unpacking a chess set on one of the library tables.

"See, Giles, my folks were just going to let it sit in storage. It's got all sorts of cool---"
 The librarian had a book in one hand, but absently helped the redhead to set up the pieces. 
Sunny put the tip of her index finger on the bell.

"There are some very interesting Celtic symbols carved into the, er, board and pieces. 
Not one of my specialties, though. Celtic."

Buffy picked up a queen. "Hm. Well, I'm going to pa—" She saw Sunny, waiting to 
give Giles her request form. Still holding a handful of pieces, Giles stood up and went to the desk. 

"Ah, yes, er, Miss---er, yes." He dropped a pawn, and Sunny
bent, picking it up and putting it on the counter. With the other hand, she placed the loan slip before him. Buffy came up
behind her, and somehow, they walked out together.

Giles put down the book, beside the chess set. Willow beamed at him.

"It is an attractive old set," he said, picking up the white queen. "It would be a shame not to play it."

"That's what I thought," Willow said.

****************************************

"You used to live on Revello, didn't you?" Buffy asked. "You and your mom
 moved during the summer?" They walked down the hall to the main door. 

"Well, she---I live with my uncle now." Sunny said baldly. She saw Buffy's eyes 
widening in dawning comprehension. "Your mom...she sure is nice. She was great to me."

Buffy shook her head. "I'm sorry. Me, clueless? It was nasty when my parents split."

Sunny pulled her keys out. "'S all right. You want a ride?" She pointed to the Camaro. "It's my uncle's."

"Jeeze, your uncle lets you drive? Cool. You're lucky."

"Gah. Trade you any day for your Mom, and your boyfriend." 

Buffy, disentangling the shoulder harness, said, "I don't have a boyfriend." Her mouth quirked in a half-smile.

Sunny started the car, and pretended to be focused on backing out of
her parking space. "Oh, right. That tall dark dude who doesn't show up at the Bronze whenever you're there.
And I don't mean Xander Harris, either."

Buffy had a pleased look on her face, but she shrugged. "Angel is not my boyfriend." She looked 
sideways at Sunny, and laughed. "Do you think he really----?"

Sunny rolled her eyes. "Oh, please! He's so not with the speaking to the rest of the class."
And that's all you get out of me, she thought.

"You don't have to take me to Revello. You can drop me at the Espresso Pump."

"Cool." Sunny made a turn. "My uncle's still at work, anyway. I'll go
get a brownie." She parked in the alley. "See? Next to the Pump? Sunnydale Wholesale 
Beauty Supply. That's my uncle's business. There's a loft apartment upstairs."

"Neat," Buffy said. They got out of the car. Someone was playing guitar inside the coffee shop. 
The notes were liquid and languid, and both girls stopped to listen.

*****************************

Back at the library, Giles said, "Actually, chess games were very significant in Celtic culture.
 The playing of chess in Celtic myth always symbolizes great forces at work." Willow tapped 
one of his closed fists. He opened his hand. "You're black," he said. He moved a pawn.

***********************


The wind came up suddenly, blowing trash and bits of leaves at them.
The sound was oddly harsh, and a street sign made a buzzing sound on
its metal pole.

Everything went quiet. Buffy turned and looked at Sunny. Everyone else
had vanished from the street.

There was no one in the Espresso Pump. There was no one on the street.
The store windows showed brightly lit, empty fronts.

"This isn't good," Buffy muttered. She wheeled at a sudden sound.
Sunny clenched her hand around the car keys, the canister of Mace.
Two vamps were standing between them and the Camaro. She backed against Buffy, 
and looked over her shoulder. Three vamps and a demon were walking towards them from the north end of the street.

Buffy grabbed her sleeve. "Run," she said. They bolted across the street and into the alley. 
Buffy leapt up and grabbed the ladder to the fire escape, dragging it down. 
"You get up there," she said, and half-picked Sunny up. Sunny scrambled up the fire escape. "Vampires—"
she began.

Buffy pulled a stake out of her waistband. "Yeah," she said. "I know."

Sunny hauled up the ladder. "I see that you do," she said under her breath.

Running noises; three of the vampires hesitated at the entrance of the blind alley,
 then pounded down. Sunny watched Buffy effortlessly stake them all: one, two, three, 
and the dust flew up and settled down.

"Holy shit," Sunny said. "You're the Slayer." She looked past Buffy's frowning, 
uptilted face. "And there's six more coming."

"I think we need to get out," Buffy said, and jumped, and swung up the fire escape. 
"Up. Let's go." The other girl needed no urging whatsoever. "Has to be magic," Buffy thought out loud.

"That, or I really shoulda paid attention to those Jehovah's Witnesses."

"I hate my life," Buffy muttered. "My life is now a game of chess."
She swung her leg over the ledge at the top, and reached down for Sunny.

"Hello, unfortunate pawn here." Sunny squinted. "Pawn. I picked up the frickin' pawn!"

"Brace me," Buffy said, and the taller girl leaned into Buffy as the Slayer began 
slamming the brackets of the fire escape with her heels. It took five kicks, but the concrete 
crumbled away, and the metal screeched away, out of sight three stories below. 
"Now, let's move." They ran across the puddled tar roof to the next building. "Questions:
You know how to dust vamps, by any chance?"

"Seen it done. Straight to the heart. Chop off the head." Sunny scissored long legs 
over the dividing wall. "M'uncle got jumped outside the drug store. I saw him do it."

"Is your uncle, what?" Buffy signed for Sunny to crouch, and they squatted behind the
 false front. Buffy cautiously looked down on to the street below. "Nothing. Maybe the f
ire escape got them for a minute." She ducked back. "Your uncle isn't a---player?"

"My uncle grew up in Sunnydale," she said. "I have no idea why my family ever moved back."

Buffy was pulling stakes out of her jacket and setting them on the roof. She didn't look up. 
"Your father is gone, right? Why did your uncle move up here? He should have taken you away, 
if he knows about this town." She picked up a stake and held it out. "Here. Try this. Don't do 
anything unless they get really close to you. They'll come after me first. You're a post-game snack."

"Yeah, that's what my uncle says. Never forget we're food." Sunny hefted the wood, then
 tugged the bandanna from her neck and began wrapping it around the palm of her hand.
 "Well, whatever. I'll try not to be too much a drag on you before they get me." She flicked 
her eyes up to Buffy, and Buffy felt oddly disconcerted. The other girl was so matter-of-factly 
bitter. Sunny tightened the knot with her teeth. "Please don't let them turn me. It would kill 
my uncle Jack to have to dust me." Her voice was sinusy with tears.

"We're both getting out of this," Buffy said firmly, looking right into Sunny's eyes.

"Promise me, Buffy. Promise me you won't let me get turned." Sunny's mouth quirked. 
"Or if you can't, please come back and take my head off as soon as you can. Just don't let Jack---" she shuddered.

"If you get dead, you'll stay dead," Buffy said. "So, try to stay behind me." 
She picked at a cuticle. "So. Chess. Know anything about it?"

Sunny blinked upwards at the night sky, refusing to acknowledge the tears in her eyes.
 "Nope. You have to go across the board and capture the king. The Queen is the piece
 that can move in any direction. That's it." She looked back at Buffy, her face reflecting 
green/white from the Sunnydale Cinema sign. "A pawn can be any piece it wants, if it makes 
it all the way across the board, like checkers when you king it."

"So you'll have to stay with me," Buffy said, and stood up, jamming the stakes back into 
her jacket and waistband. "We need to get some place that we can barricade. The office supply store."

"Or the shop. There's a magic protection spell on it," Sunny said, pointing with the 
stake. "My uncle got a shaman to put it on."

"Okay, why is a guy that smart still in Sunnydale? Masochist, much?"

Sunny shrugged one shoulder. "Gotta make money somewhere, I guess---" she broke off.

"I hear them. Move." Buffy sprinted across the long level rooftops, jumping the dividing
 parapets like a hurdler. She heard Sunny's hiking boots splattering gravel behind her. 
They fetched up against the last wall. "Oops." 

They were at the end of the block. "Aw, shit," Sunny said, skidding to a stop beside her. "What now?" 

Buffy measured the distance with narrowed eyes. "I'm going to dust those four vamps 
when they come up. If I can sling any off the roof, I will. You get down and you stake any of 
'em that land beside you."

There was a crunch at the corner of the building. A vamp's face appeared. 

"Ooh, or I do it now," Buffy said, and in three strides, kicked the vampire in the
 head, and it fell off the side. Buffy leaned over, and saw it hit a dumpster, catching 
it on her neck. It dusted, very satisfactorily. She heard a squeak, and saw Sunny 
brace herself, stake held underhand, as another vampire threw an arm and leg over
 the side of the building. Damn, diversions. Buffy raced back, and kicked that vamp in the face.

The original four were upon them now, and she concentrated on the closest two, standing 
in front of Sunny. Pow, and pow, but she got turned around, damn it. The vamp woman was
 yanking on Sunny's foot and pulling her away from the wall. Sunny was kicking her in the face 

with the other foot, screaming curses that were filthy even by high school standards. 
The last vamp dodged Sunny's feints with the stake, her fangs open in a grin. Buffy 
stepped up and staked her, but by that time, the male had pulled Sunny completely 
away from the wall, and was straddling her.

"BUFFY!" Sunny shrieked, trying to push the stake up to the vamp's heart, but both 
her arms were held by the vamp. Buffy leaped and landed both feet on the vamp's face, 
her momentum carrying them both clear from Sunny, and on the forward roll, her stake went home.

Buffy stood up, coughing. Sunny was sitting up, still clutching her stake. Her right jeans 
leg was shredded, but she looked fine. 

"I'm going to jump. You're coming along for the ride," Buffy said, walking over and extending
her left hand. "Grab my arm, run with me, and step up when I do."

They grabbed each other's forearms, and Buffy said, "On the count of three. One. Two. Three." 
They ran, stride for stride over the roof, stepped up, and Buffy threw herself like an Olympic 
contender through the night sky, across and down and towing Sunny like a kite. Buffy's feet 
hit, impossibly, the roof of the dress shop and she reflectively whipped her left arm in front for 
balance. If Sunny hadn't been clinging with both hands, Buffy would have slung her off the other 
side of the building. As it was, they spun around a couple of times, like same-gender pairs 
skaters, until they let go of each other. 

Sunny sank to the roof, bracing herself on one hand, the other cradled against her chest. 
"I think you broke my finger," she said. "But. Shit baby damn." She looked up through her 
wet bangs, her eyes bright. "I might actually be alive tomorrow."

Buffy sniffed. "I give a seven point five on the technical, but a six on the artistic." She 
saw a skylight behind them. "Let's go inside."

Sunny stood up, and followed her. Buffy kicked the glass in, and knelt to pull it open. 
"Let me go, and I'll get you." Buffy jumped down, landing on a counter. She looked up at 
Sunny, whose head and shoulders were visible against the drizzling, black sky. "Come on, I'll catch you if you miss."

Sunny withdrew, and Buffy next felt a drop of blood hit her. She wiped her face, and 
saw Sunny coming in feet-first. One jeans leg was dark with blood. She landed, 
nimbly enough, beside Buffy, and Buffy caught her by the upper arms. 

"Did the vamp---oh, scratches."

"Yeah, kinda stings," Sunny said, making a face. "A lot." She sat down on the 
counter, looking around in the dark. "I lost my stake. Where are---"

"Shoe repair," Buffy said, jumping down from the corner. "Must be something we 
can use, here." The streetlights shown in through the crossed bars of the anti-theft 
windows, showing the shop in shades of gray and deep black shadow.

"Wood," Sunny agreed. She kept glancing up at the skylight. "Buffy, some of these
 buildings connect by pass-through doors. We need to get somewhere without a hole in the ceiling." 

Buffy looked over her shoulder. She had found a wooden kitchen chair and was 
breaking it into pieces. "You know a lot about vamps, Sunny. Really---what is your uncle? A player?"

Sunny blinked in the half-light. "He cuts Angel's hair," she said reluctantly. 

"Wait---my Angel?" There was so much more to this. She had said Angel's name the way Buffy said it to Willow.

"Well, yeah. Vampire hair grows. He's not using the gel right, though."
Sunny cleared her throat. "I mean, that's what Jack keeps telling him.
It's the mirror issue."

"So you know him, then." Buffy looked down, and picked up the chair spindles. 
"Take these. So what you said, earlier?"

"Yeah, but I wasn't lying about the Bronze. And it's not like we're pals. 
At all. He doesn't know my name."

Buffy flashed a look at her. "You have a thing for him."

Sunny's mouth curled up in the same way that it had when she had talked 
about being turned. "I could have five hundred things for him and it wouldn't 
matter. I'm not even on his radar screen. Never will be. So don't worry about it." 
She looked around, a bit blindly, and picked up a towel. Sitting on a box of shoe 
polish, she swiped at her leg. "I better wrap this up or they'll track me." 

Buffy yanked a bag of chamois cloths open, and knelt down. "Slayers know 
wounds," she said. "So, your uncle is a friend of Angel's?" 

"Yeah, sort of. Jack hears a lot of things at the barbershops and places, 
and passes it on to Angel. But, since—-that's too tight—we're being all honest, 
Jack saved his life this summer."

Buffy ripped the last cloth and used it to tie the others. "While I was in L.A." 
She went to the front window and, standing in the shadows, peered out at the 
street. "Since this is a game, do you think it takes time for more vamps to come up?"

"They're coming by sixes," Sunny said, rolling down her pants leg. She uncapped 
a cup of cold coffee, and rinsed the blood from her hands, spilling it on the floor. 
"We've probably stayed in here too long to risk a run out in the street. So, let's 
see if there's a sewer grate in the basement." She looked apologetic. "I live 
downtown. There's frickin' sewer walkways through the whole town. No wonder its Vamp Central."

Buffy moved from the window, and followed Sunny through a small door in the 
back of the store. When Buffy had stepped down, Sunny carefully closed the door and turned on the light.

"Look, a grate," Buffy said flatly. "Nothing surprises me about Sunnydale, 
but nothing." She clomped down the wooden stairs. "Even a flashlight."

"Well, shit," Sunny said, behind her. "The shop is probably owned by demons or something."

"Or the vamps were driving us to it," Buffy agreed, clicking the Mag-Lite 
on and off. "Which makes my head hurt." She thumped the handle of the 
flashlight in her palm. "Let's not and say we did," she said.

Sunny shrugged. Buffy made up her mind, and leaped on her, taking her
to the filthy concrete floor. Before Sunny could even change expressions, Buffy was 
pressing her cross against her face.

Which did not smolder and burn? Buffy let the cross slide out of her fingers, to dangle 
back inside her collar. She released the choke hold.

"You psycho bitch!" Sunny wheezed. "You freak!"

And above them, were the thumps of feet hitting the floor.

"Sewer," Buffy said, and grabbed Sunny's wrist.

*************

Slayer strength was as excellent a tool for warping the hasps of sewer grates 
as it was for tackling innocent pawns. Sunny waited at the foot of the ladder, her 
sour expression only partly due to the smell of rotten vegetation.

This is an underground stream, she thought. The basements must all have sump 
pumps going directly into it, and how freaking weird is it that I'm thinking about that, 
when the Slayer just jumped me and six vampires are after us? Well, the Sunnydale 
sewer system was a dream come true for night creatures. They were in a tunnel and
 the lights were on in the grated lanterns, casting yellow light all the way down the line.
 Far down, there were white spots, possibly light from above.

Jeeze, even if they got out of this, she'd probably get gangrene from the nasty water 
infecting the vampire scratches. Rabies. Something.

Buffy dropped down the ladder. "I've patrolled here," she said. "Come on." She went, 
in the opposite direction from where Sunny thought the Beauty Supply alley would be. 
"If we're playing some kind of magic game, then we'd better go to the king. And that's 
always straight ahead. Our home row must be where we started." There was no noise
 in the tunnel, except their footsteps and the low sound of water.


Out of nowhere, Something charged hard at Sunny, throwing her into the
curved concrete wall. Grunt, grunt, and poof! The now-usual shower of dust.

Buffy crouched beside the other girl. "Can you breathe?" she whispered.

Sunny looked up at her, her vision doubling in and out. "No. Yes." She turned away, 
bracing herself on one elbow, and retched. Nothing came up.

"They're pretty far off," Buffy said, sitting back on her heels. She raised the back of 
her wrist to her forehead, so she could swipe the hair from her forehead without losing 
her grip on her stake. "Pretty weird there's no one else here, I mean, no one except us 
and them. No demons or other players on our side."

Sunny sat up. "Give me a stake," she said. She looked around. "Is it my imagination, 
or is the water rising?"

They looked down at the channel. The black water was higher. 

"There's a ladder. I vote we go up and out." Buffy stuck one stake in her waistband,
 and handed the other to Sunny. "Okay. Since I'm, you know, freakishly strong, you 
just hold on. I think I can pull you with me if you hold on to my arm." She and Sunny 
clasped forearms. "Don't keep losing stakes, 'kay?"

Sunny grimaced. "I'll try."
************

The ladder had a square, unlocked grate covering it, instead of a manhole cover. 
The girls clung to the top rungs, pressing their faces against the grate. "Me first,"
 breathed Buffy in Sunny's ear, and cracked it open. She didn't see anything in any 
direction. However, they were in a side alley near the school. Buffy could see the amber 
lights of the campus, not too far distant.

There were weapons in the school library, of course, but the doors were locked. 
"If Giles and Willow were playing the game in the library, could that be home base?" she murmured.

"What if we have to go in a circle all the way around the beginning point? The Espresso 
Pump?" Sunny whispered. She had stepped up on the other side of the metal ladder, 
bracing herself with the left wrist of her broken hand, the stake clenched in her right. 

Buffy blinked. "You know, if we just knew what game it was. If it was chess, we'd see 
someone like me, wouldn't we? So it's...darn it...six at a time, against us two." She 
climbed out, and held up the heavy grate while Sunny slithered out.

"Maybe I'm not supposed to be here," Sunny panted. "Where to?"

"We run around the square, until we get back to where we started. Right down the 
middle of the street, so they can't jump us. We can go straight up until the office complex. 
Then we'll have to cut through to avoid the park. There's a building with that Spanish-looking 
tile; it's the jump-up to the roofs on the other side of the square. We run the roofs until we get to the theatre, 
then down to that new little arcade."

They stood, back to back, scanning the night, faint showers of mist showing up like snow flakes in the 
light of the street lamps and the moon. Buffy looked around again, but she didn’t see anything. "Walk first."

"Six and six and one," Sunny said. "Five left from the first six. I'm betting there'll be six more after these 
five. Wish I'd paid more attention in math class." She kept scanning the edges of the field.

Buffy sharpened her tone, to draw Sunny's eyes back to her. "So your uncle saved Angel's life,
 this summer. What happened?"

"Three vamps and a Chardhu demon jumped Angel outside the store and were stomping 
he shit out of him. The vamps think he's a traitor to his kind, you know, and apparently 
Angel killed the demon's mate. They had slung chains around him and suchlike." Sunny 
was looking at Buffy as she spoke, now. Buffy was fairly interested in what had happened to 
Angel, but she really wanted her companion's attention to be on her, and not on what was 
silently following them, out of her peripheral vision.

"The Chardwho poisoned him," Buffy nodded, picking up her pace slightly, seeing if 
Sunny could trot alongside. "He took the first one out back in, April, I think he told Giles." 
Buffy saw the first of the low business buildings. "Why did your uncle care?"

"Well, Angel saved him. It's a whole guy sav-a-thon." Sunny was a little breathless, but 
she kept talking. "Jack ran his truck into them just on general principles, but then he 
recognized Angel. So he brought him back to the shop, and went to LA to go get something 
for the Chardhu venom." She saw the shadows moving, just as Buffy did, and they both ran 
flat-out to the small office complex ablaze with amber energy-saving light.

Buffy had the advantage of a year's worth of patrols, and where the sprinkler systems 
and fountains and benches were; some of the vamps behind them did not, and she heard 
a loud splash behind them, as the anonymous office walls rang with hers and Sunny's racing footsteps.
She had never had to fight with someone she had to protect, at least not for so long a time. 
Willow and Xander were handy with a stake; even better was Giles, who seemed to tap 
into the old ultra-violence, and one day she'd have to remember to ask Xander what movie that was.


A vamp in a housewifely denim skirt ran out of a doorway and made a lunge at Sunny, 
grabbing her by the thick braid of hair and sending her flying, the vamp leaping on her 
with fangs. Then there was a crunch, as Sunny head-butted the woman, and then the roar and whoosh of air.

Sunny lay sprawled inelegantly on her back, knees in the air, and stake still in her fist. 
She looked as surprised as the vamp must have. Buffy reached down and yanked her up by the forearm.

They ran through the parking lot, past the trees in their tidy flower plots, to the building with the 
Spanish tile. Buffy easily jumped onto the decorative wall, bracing herself and reaching for Sunny. 

The remaining four vamps were at the foot of the wall, and Sunny turned
immediately, stake held underhand like a switchblade. With her jeans, and jean jacket, 
Tomb Raider braid and the hiking boots, together with the height, she looked far more like 
a Slayer than the short blonde with the sparkly fingernail polish and the pink skirt and stacked 
heels. That and the blood that was trickling from her forehead.

Buffy jumped back down and took a stance in front of Sunny. "Hit clean-up," she ordered.

"Batter up?" Sunny offered.

The vampires were in a semi-circle. Buffy waited for one of them to break it. They all looked like they were dumb, 
just risen types, not older vamps who used a little cunning. These just wanted to attack. One did, and Buffy got 
in a good little kick, kick, stake rhythm. A second one came at her, and she feinted, and sent the vamp 
sliding on his face, straight to Sunny. Sunny must have staked him, because the whoosh occurred, and Sunny coughed.

The next one fell to Buffy's sweeping right foot, and she staked him down through the middle of his 
nasty tie-dyed tee shirt.

The last vamp backed up, backed up, and ran away.

"That's messing up my count," Sunny complained. She put the stake down her shirt collar, presumably 
in her bra, and used her good hand to vault up on the wall. 

Buffy leapt up effortlessly, and stood, hands on hips, surveying their options. She critically scanned 
the whitewashed brick wall before them, and brightened. "Look---enough bricks have been knocked 
out all the way up, to climb." She pointed. "You first, and I'll brace you."


"Oh, fuck," Sunny said, but wearily wedged the toe of her boot into the first gap in the bricks. She 
reached up with her right hand, and pulled herself up. "Fuckity fuck fuck," she groaned.

"Nice language! You kiss your moth---" Buffy closed her mouth hard, and concentrated on climbing 
up behind Sunny. She braced her shoulder against Sunny's butt, and boosted her. Sunny kicked 
the wall, and made a larger hole for her boot. After a moment, she was over the parapet, 
and Buffy swung herself over.

Sunny was in a crouch, carefully rewinding her bandanna around her left hand. "When you 
were gone one weekend," she said, not looking at Buffy, "My mom brought her boyfriend 
home. I was trying to do a paper." She stood up and followed Buffy across the roof. "I hadn't 
seen my dad in a long time, before the divorce. And then, he died in a wreck in Orange County, 
and we weren't told. Until the child support became an insurance payment. My mom couldn't get 
her hands on the money." They were at the next roof, and they stepped over the low divider.

Buffy frowned. "My mom---is that---"

"Yeah. My mother brought the asshole home, and they got scary-ass drunk. They--he, tried 
to get into my bedroom. He started breaking down the door. I went out the window in my 
pajamas and your mom was in the yard, with her cell phone, ready to call the police.
So she took to your house. And she called my uncle." Sunny grimaced.
"My mom left with the asshole. Sold the house. Be just like her to get turned and come 
back looking for me." She peered around at the roof. "So now you know."

"I thought I was bitter about the whole dying young for the sacred duty part. Wow," Buffy 
said, embarrassed again.

"Oh, you're supposed to die young? That sucks." Sunny grinned. "Makes me feel better." 
There was a faint clanging sound below them. "Lots better," Sunny said, her smile vanishing.

"Run," Buffy said, grabbing her right hand. 

They were on top of the theatre now, the retro-green of the sign turning the mist an odd 
cartoony color. The narrow arcade of the dress shop was just below them, and Buffy made 
for the fire escape.

It only went down one story; it was broken. Sunny looked sick, glancing over Buffy's shoulder. 
"The hunt is here," she said.


"Down anyway," Buffy said. They clambered down, and Buffy calculated
distances, hanging on to the broken stair. She could lower Sunny down with one hand. 
She'd only have about 6 feet to drop, then, from her feet to the sidewalk. "C'mere, I'm 
going to drop you." Once again, they clasped forearms, and Buffy hung on one rung with her left hand,
dangling Sunny in the other.

A vampire threw one leg over the roof, above their head. Buffy was about to drop Sunny, 
when she saw the vamps coming up from below.
Without time to warn Sunny, Buffy kicked her feet against the wall and threw 
Sunny out and over the heads of the vamps, and without waiting to
see where the girl landed, jumped on them. They were still turned, waiting to 
see where Sunny had landed, when Buffy staked them both.

When the dust cleared, Buffy could see Sunny, lying between the split 
ends of the cement bench she had been thrown onto. 

More vamps were coming up the street.
*************

Sunny lay, gasping for air. Nothing hurt, this time, which was scary. She knew blood was running 
down her face. Above her, Buffy set her feet on either side of Sunny and prepared to defend them. 
It was more that she knew Buffy was there, heard her breathing, felt the slight nudge of Buffy's boot-heel 
on her side, rather than saw her. Things were graying out.

I'm dying, Sunny thought without interest. Her hands were so cold.
"Buffy," she said, with dry mouth. "Leave me and run."

"Nope. We're together. That's the plan. Besides, don't want you to be turned, remember?"

Sunny tried to see her, and squeezed her eyes shut and opened them. All she could see 
was Buffy, a stake in each hand, and she loved her stubbornness so much that a tear rolled out of one eye.

"Oh, no," said a woman. "I will not forfeit my game."

"The hell?" Buffy said. "Did you hear that, Sunny?"

"Yeah."

"Girls," said the woman's voice.

Everything around them went whiter, and the lines of the brick arcades became 
very sharp. Sunny could see Buffy, standing over her, and a shape of someone on the very 
edge of her vision. She couldn't turn her head.

"The game is over. You two will be returned to the beginning, and it will as though the spell 
were never cast. All will be---"

"Will we remember?" Buffy said sharply. Sunny suddenly stopped hearing anything, or, more 
likely, she had passed out, because when she could hear again, Buffy was arguing. "----It’s 
not fair, we're friends, she could help me---"

"No, I think not. I am concerned with the balance of things. I will restore the balance." A pause. 
"I am not here for you."

"Are you here for me?" Sunny asked, and then realized there was no sound coming out of her throat. 
She felt the pressure of the woman's attention almost immediately, so she must have been heard.

"I am not here for you. I have come to restore the balance. Bring her to me." 

It was very dark. Buffy said, hesitating, "You're standing in water."

"Bring her to me."

Sunny felt hands under her shoulders, and she was being dragged into a puddle of rainwater. 
Like Buffy said, the hell? Her jacket and jeans were soaking, and she shivered.

"Water is life," the woman said, right over her head and behind her, and how freaking "Dune" was that?

Everything began hurting, from her scalp, where the vamp had yanked her braid, her ribs, 
her back, her hand, to her scraped and scratched shins, and her feet in the broken boots. 

Buffy's face, covered in fine grit, was very close to hers. "The cuts are closing," she whispered.
 "She's healing you." She dropped the stakes, and pulled Sunny to a sitting position. "Can you breathe?"

"Yeah," Sunny said. She blinked, and saw her torn, wet jeans; saw the street lights glinting in 
the puddles, and on the glazed brick of the arcade, Buffy's pearly gray nail polish on the fingers 
that gripped Sunny's sleeve; saw the fine mist still making all the lights twinkle. She held up her 
left hand and saw the bent, warped fingers straighten back to normal. Just like Angel's had, only faster.

Angel, she thought, a different pain in her chest. "Can I forget Angel? If I'm going to forget tonight, 

and who Buffy is, can I forget who Angel is?"

"No."

"But I don't want to feel this way! What's the point, what was the point of all this and me 
getting the shit kicked out of me and then we don't remember tonight and aren't friends?" 
Sunny raged, slapping at the water all around her. With Buffy's help, she got to her feet 
and turned to face the woman.

There was nothing there except the empty street.

Sunny turned, back to Buffy, and tried to speak. Nothing came out. 

The other girl nodded. "Yeah. I do that a lot, too." She tapped Sunny's left wrist. "No more 
broken bones. No souvenirs."

"Buffy, you're---you're a good person to have around."

Buffy suddenly gave her a wide, dazzling smile. "I'm the Slayer."

"And I'm all wet. Isn't that nice and metaphorical." She looked past Buffy to the 
quiet street. "Return to the beginning."

"Let's walk back to the Espresso Pump," Buffy said, bending down and
retrieving her stakes. "You're pretty handy with a stake, yourself. Too bad you're 
going to go back to ignoring me." She walked out into the wet street, and Sunny fell into step with her.

"Well, you take up the best library tables," Sunny said, "And the Mom, and the 
undead boyfriend." She managed to sound cheerful.

"Not my boyfriend. You have driviness. You have the Kiefer Sutherland uncle---well, 
not so much fun for you, of course---and his Camaro."

"This is true. And, since it's all going to be mind-wiped, a part-time job at the only demon 
barbershop in Sunnydale."

Buffy stopped in the middle of the street. "Oh, I knew you were holding out!" She looked 
both annoyed and amused. "You sneak!"

"I don't want you to come in and kill the customers, girlfriend. That's my spending money." 
They were walking again.

The Espresso Pump was only a few feet away, brightly lit, the tables and chairs empty. 
"Well," Buffy said.

"Well." They awkwardly hugged each other. 

"Nice knowing you," Buffy said into Sunny's shoulder.

"Thanks for saving my life five hundred times tonight." They hugged each other, hard, 
and let go. Sunny watched Buffy take a deep breath, and they both stepped on to the sidewalk.

Nothing happened, nothing kept happening long enough for them to turn and look at each other. 
Then, someone walked heavily into Sunny, and she dropped her car keys.

"Hey, rude much?" Buffy Summers was saying to someone. They stared at each other. 
They were both dusty. They looked like someone had shaken a rug on them. They stared at 
each other, bound by the knowledge and denial that not even dust was just dust, in Sunnydale.

Buffy briskly rubbed her palms together. "Thanks for the ride, Sunny. See you Monday."

"Yeah," Sunny said, finally scooping her keys from the sidewalk. She felt exhausted. 
"See you Monday." She turned, and walked slowly down the sidewalk to the back entrance of the Beauty Supply.

*****************
"Xander!"

"I'm sorry, I slipped. Look, I'll pick them up."

"Oh, it wasn't---I was about to take Giles' queen."
Willow almost pouted, hesitated. "Wasn't I?"

Giles barely smiled. "Quick, get them before they
roll under the book stacks."
******************




It was that first summer that Sunny lived with Jack, and worked in the barbershop,
that she understood that she had fallen down the rabbit hole and was never coming back.

That was in her calmer moments. In the moments when she woke up in her old bed
in the new bedroom, her pulse racing, she thought that her life had gone irretrievably
to hell before she was 17.

True, the whole year prior had been a lead-up, with the whole family-imploding-
disintegrating thing, with moving into the loft apartment, which had been change enough.
 But things really changed when she started working with her uncle Jack. He was only 
twenty years older than she was, and so unlike a parent or guardian that he had bought 
his first suit to go to court. Her mind swerved away from that. So much younger that he 
never, out of an excess of caution, did more than give her a pat on the shoulder or arm. 
Because hunky youngish uncle and teenage niece? Recipe for social workers to come around.

Jack told her so, himself. "I'm not a dad, Sunny," he said earnestly. "I was the
kid brother. We've got to be careful. I've got to watch my language around you,
because if you fuck up---aw, shit!" She finally laughed, and perhaps that's what
he intended her to do. "Anyway, anything you do, or say, the Child Welfare people
could use as an excuse to stick you in a group home or something." 
His expression darkened. "It beats dealing with what really goes on here," 
he said, biting into his Hawaiian Burger. "It's called a Hellmouth..."

Weeks later, she was still dazed at the sudden deluge of information,
 all the most incredible confirmation of real life horror, told around mouthfuls of soy burger. 
"All sorts of demonic energy concentrates here. Vampires, witches, demons in 
human form, and demons in animal form....you name it." He looked at her, 
seriously. "I'm not just telling you this. It's been like this for a hundred 
years, and a third of the people here deal with it, and a third are ignorant, 
and a third are in denial. I've always known it. Your dad----well, he was smart. 
I think he just didn't want to know. It's not like you grow up and ask other 
college students, Hey, what was the death rate 
for your high school class? Many demons on your football team?"

"We're not, though, are we? Demons? Witches? Anything that would be in a 
comic book?"

"Well, your dad was a corporate lawyer," Jack said, and grinned to let her know it was a joke. 
"It's mainly the vampires. We get a lot of them. A couple of them, I went to school with 'em. 
Doesn't matter, we're just Tender Vittles to 'em."

"If vampires are so evil, why don't they bite you?"

"Who's going to cut their hair? It freaks out most hairdressers not to have a 
reflection." Sunny rolled her eyes. "Okay. The building is charmed. No demonic 
activity. It's like a no-fire zone. Got the idea from a bar I used to go to in L.A."

"So, when you cut their hair, how do they know you did it right?"

"I take a Polaroid." He finished the burger, and wadded up the wrapper. "If
you want to earn some money while Meena's gone, you can start. Cleaning up,
shampoos. If you like it, I can start teaching you how to cut."

Sunny looked up, cautiously. "How much money?"

Jack smiled at her. "That's my girl."


It gave her something to think about instead of learning
where the plates were stored in this kitchen, what kind of toilet paper this 
bathroom had, and at least she had her own bathroom and a tree shaded her bedroom
windows from the street. It was hella cooler than her old room.
The burglar bars and the crucifix kind of took something away, though. Summer
vacation and she didn't have to learn her new walk home. Yet.

The demon shop was in the back of the Supply building. The wholesale 
customers came in the front, and the retail customers came in from the alley. 
Retail customers. Heh. The type that came in under the deep shade, or through the
sewer. Or sometimes, in a Lexus, because that couldn't be a green scaly thing
driving a Lexus in broad daylight, could it? Nah.

It was a quiet Sunday evening. Jack had the alley door propped open, and the last 
red gold lights were tingeing the western sky. "Good night to go to the beach,"
Jack said, almost to himself. "You ever go to the beach, here, Sunny?" He leaned
in the doorway, an Espresso Pump mochacino in his hand.

Sunny leaned on the broom. "We moved here in January, remember?" She looked out
the door. "When will I meet any vampires?"

"You have, already. Ellis, Lamar. They're vamps." He grinned.

"They were here during the day!" She couldn't believe it.

"They came in through the sewer in the afternoon." Jack finished his drink and 
tossed the cup neatly into the alley. It fell on a storm grate. "See? There.
That's how Angel comes in, too."

"Angel?"

"He comes on Tuesdays. He's a good guy. Kills the other vamps. Seems like
he has a soul, or some such. At any rate, he doesn't kill us. He likes to
hear the gossip, so he comes in when the Ana-movics come in. Those guys
can't shut up." Jack looked up. "He's the only one that wouldn't drain you."
He nodded, as if seeing something in her face. "He saved my life." He reached
around and pulled the door closed. "So be nice to him."
He picked up the remote and turned on the television for the A's game. "You
can go back upstairs, if you want. I don't think much is going to happen."

"When will Meena be back?" Meenakshi was Jack's assistant, but she had
gone to a wedding in Toronto. In her pictures on Jack’s bulletin board,
Meena looked like a college student, like any other Indian American girl, 
but she was apparently a demon and about 38. Of course,
since the pictures showed her cheek-to-cheek with a bride with a bright 
blue face, it was an easy mistake to make.

"Next month. I hope. A lot of the regulars miss her. All those Bengali CDs are 
hers, but so is the Dave Matthews and Nirvana. She's eclectic."

Jack sat down at his station, and turned up the television. "Go ahead, go
do stuff." 

Sunny sped upstairs to surf the Internet.


It was very, very early in the morning, but not light outside. "Sunny," Jack
said, from just outside her door. "Can you get dressed and come downstairs?
I need your help."

Sunny sat up, tossing the quilt aside. "Yeah," she said, reaching for her 
bra and sweatshirt. When she tugged on her clothes, she opened her door.
Jack was fully dressed, but his shirt was bloody. At her stare, he said,
"its Angel. He got jumped last night. I need you to help me." On the stairs,
he added, "He told me it was a bunch of vamps and a Chardhu demon. They're
poisonous. I need to go to LA and get anti-venom."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Well, later, deliver the wholesale orders. I'll leave the truck. Right
now, help me clean him up a little. He's about to pass out." Jack took
her arm. "He looks pretty bad, but don't worry. Vamps heal quickly."

Just inside the barbershop, lay a black coat on the floor. There was a 
trail of blood from the front door to the man sprawled in the first chair
at the sink. In the single light above the sink, his face looked horribly
swollen and distorted with bruises and deep cuts. He had one eye barely
open, the other closed in a black bruise. His hands were wrapped in two
wet towels. Then she realized that he didn't have a man's face to
start with.

"Angel, this is my niece, Sunny. She's going to help me." The wounded man---
the wounded vampire---nodded. Jack turned on the water at the sink, and 
motioned to Sunny. "Wash the blood out of his hair, let's see if there's
any glass or shit." He pulled out the spray nozzle impatiently, and Sunny
realized that she was standing there, mouth open, staring. She unlocked her
knees and began carefully washing...blood...into the bowl. Well, the sink was black
ceramic, so it weirdly less disturbing.

Under the blackening crusts of blood on his face, the guy was still fanged. 
And trying to talk to Jack. "Chardhu. I killed its mate. Bit the hell 
out of my hand." Jack had his good scissors and was cutting off Angel's shirt
and undershirt to get to the wounds.

Angel had a slash above his left ear that was still pulsing blood. Sunny 
dropped the sprayer into the sink and yanked a small towel out of the
cabinet. 

"Get me a couple of those and fold 'em up," Jack said to her. To Angel,
he said, "Does this Chardhu have horns? Did he gore you or is this a knife?"
Sunny passed the hand towels to Jack, and was able to see Angel's face
shift, become slightly more human.

"What's the difference?" Angel panted. Sunny could barely hear him.

"Tells me how much anti-venom I have to buy, asshole. In LA. You're welcome."

Angel's broken mouth moved in a small smile. "Thanks."
Then he passed out.

"Good," Jack said briskly. "Sunny, under the last sink are some rolls of 
gauze. Let's strap him up while he's out."

The vampire woke up while Jack was winding the bandages around Angel's belly.
He was able to walk, leaning heavily on Sunny and Jack, to the private office.
where he collapsed on the couch.

"I'm going to go to the butcher's," Jack said. "You go upstairs and eat." He
looked at his watch. "Or, if you want to, go run those deliveries and get 
yourself something disgusting to eat for yourself. I'd like you to stay here with Angel
while I'm gone." He held out the truck keys and a ten dollar bill.

"Greasy sausage and biscuit," she said, snatching the keys and money. 

"You don't mind hanging in here? Don't let anyone in, of course, and don't
open the blinds. Sunlight---"

"I remember. Is the list up front?"

Walking up the hallway to the Wholesale Beauty Supply, she was dazzled by
the morning sun slanting through the blinds, making everything gold. The air,
ruffling her hair and the sacks of merchandise in her arms, smelled like
that great, fresh hay smell.

Which made the contrast all the greater when she let herself in through the
alley side, and walked into the dim shop to Jack's office.

That's when she woke up, from more than her early morning daze. She felt 
like she was waking up from a month of numbness, to realize that everything was real.
Her dad was dead; her mom had left her like an abandoned dog. Her sweet,
handsome uncle was her only parent, and not only was he clueless about how
to raise a girl, he owned a demon barbershop. 

Vampires were real, and the only good vampire was the one lying on her
uncle's couch, not moving, of course, because he didn't have to breathe. 
(Jack said that Angel was so old and so accustomed to being around humans, 
that he breathed as a courtesy, to fit in.)

Jack was listening to his voice mail, writing down orders, upstairs in the
loft apartment. Where all the windows were open to the sky.

"I wouldn't leave him here, but it's too far from evening, and he's in bad shape. 
And I owe him. That's probably why he got jumped. Must have faked him out, 
he thought he was saving someone."

"I don't mind checking on him. He doesn't look like he could do anything. If I get 
worried, I can always go upstairs, can't I? I mean, you never invited him in, did 
you." 

Sunny was eating her way through a box of doughnuts, perched on the bar
stool at the kitchen counter. Even though her bedroom and bath took up the end
third of the space, the loft was pretty roomy and cool, she thought, looking around.
She knew that she was deliberately avoiding the idea of the undead bleeding guy
downstairs.

Jack stood, jangling the car keys. "I've got to go. You keep your cross on. Tell 
him I'll bring him more blood when I come back." He looked down at the floor, as
if seeing the man on the couch, a floor below them. "He probably won't wake up again."
"It's Monday. No one's coming in to the barbershop, so don't even turn the
lights on. You should be okay, right?"

Sunny swallowed another doughnut and tried to say "right," with 
disastrous results.


After spending an hour on the internet, Sunny squared her shoulders and went
downstairs, to the shop. She figured that she may as well launder all the bloodied
hair towels. Jack must really trust this guy, or me, to let me do this. But 
there wasn't really anything to do, but make sure the hand towels stayed wet on 
his bashed-in face and hands. 

The barbershop was cool, and quiet, but to be sure, Sunny shut the door to the 
wholesale store, and the only sounds were of the classical radio program, and 
the whir of the ceiling fans. She went about her chores, straightening the barber 
stations and making sure the sinks were clean; needlessly, since no one had
been in since last night. Just the one bloodied one need washing.

She heard a faint noise, and saw Angel in the doorway, battered hands on his 
head, leaning heavily against the door frame. "Buffy?" he said, squinting. He 
looked like he was falling, and she dropped the clean towels and went to him, wedging 
her shoulder under his armpit. She'd never get him picked up if he fell. He leaned 
heavily on her and let her turn him back into the office. "At the barbershop?" 
he asked. He sounded like his mouth hurt, but his features were starting to be 
recognizable as human.

"Yes," she said. "I mean, not Buffy. Barbershop. Lie back down." 

At her voice, he peered at her, straining to see. He cracked an eye open, and the 
white was red. "I don't know you," he said, low. Disappointed, but unsurprised.

"I'm Jack's niece," she said. "Sunny."

His mouth---the part not scabbed over---quirked up. "Not a good name for a---"

"Jack told me you were a vampire," she said. "That you were the only one like 
you." She braced herself, and tried to steady him to the couch, but they still over-
balanced and she fell on him. He grunted, harshly, in pain, and she flung herself 
away from him onto the floor. "I'm sorry I hurt you," she said, on her hands 
and knees. "I'll leave you alone." Her elbow had connected with his
middle.

"No," he murmured. "Wait---" he put his hand to his stomach and held the palm out.
What she could see of his expression, under the swelling, he looked completely
dazed.

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Bright red blood. Jack would kill her. She leaped to
her feet and skidded out to the shop to get more towels. She shoved one under 
the tap, and ran back, dripping, to the office. Gauze. Shit. She threw the
clean towels on the floor, breathing, "Hold on," and grabbed a plastic tub
and threw scissors, the last roll of gauze, and a bottle of peroxide into it.

Back to the office, where she could smell the blood. Angel, shirtless and bleeding,
was sitting up, holding both hands to his belly. Sunny grabbed the wastepaper 
basket from beside the desk, trying to remember how Jack did this. She knelt
between Angel's knees and cut the bandage on each side of his hand, so she
could pull the ends off and fling them into the trash. He flinched at her fingers
as she pried his hands away, and let the sodden towel fall into her hands from
the horrible wound. 

She tossed the towel into the pan, and made herself step back, turn the overhead
light on, turn on the desk lamp and point it at the couch. She'd have to wipe the
bloody fingerprints off, later. With her face almost at his chest, it wasn't too
bad--she wasn't looking at guts, just muscles and mashed up skin.

"It should be closing up," Angel said above her head, his voice barely a puff of
air. She jerked away from the faint spray of blood from the wound, in time to
get a face full of it when he coughed.

Well, that's what did look like. Except that blood was welling up. She folded a
hand towel, and pressed it down, hard. Angel hissed, breathing. She grabbed his
hand and made him hold it down, then she wound the gauze around him, reaching
her arms around him, pulling it so tight that she almost put her foot on his
chest for leverage. She wouldn't have thought the undead would feel pain,
but tears were rolling down Angel's wreck of a face. Sweat was dripping into
her eyes. She pulled the sleeve of her shirt up and swiped at her face.

Angel was shivering, eyes closed, and she wiped the streaks of blood from his
chest, his hands and arms. The waist band of his pants was soaked. "I'm going
to get you something to wear, 'kay?" She threw the nasty towels into the basin
and carried them out to throw in the washer with the others.

Walking upstairs, she noticed that her fingernails were rimmed in dried blood,
and her hands were powdery with it. In the bathroom mirror, her face was splotched
with blood. She scrubbed at her knuckles and then splashed her face with the soapy
water. One of Jack's flannel shirts and his ratty old sweatpants, and whenwhenwhen
was she thinking of a VAMPIRE as a something other than this freak show of her
Star Wars-cantina life?

Back in the office, she turned off the overhead. Angel was able to put his swollen
hands through the sleeves of the shirt, but she had to button it. She bent and
untied his boots and pulled them off. "Not to get all personal on you, but do
you wear underwear? I don't mind helping you, but I haven't seen a real---much less
a---shit." She looked up, and his chest was shaking. 

He put his forearms against his chest. "Stop. It hurts to laugh."

"Oh. Broken ribs?" she asked, setting his boots off to the side.

"No, I never laugh," he said, chuckling. "Boxers. You'll have to unzip me, and
I hope your uncle doesn't walk in. He'll stake me."

Gingerly, Sunny unbuttoned his pants. The material was bloody, and her fingernails
were getting yucked-up again. "Ew," she said.

"Not what a guy likes to hear when a pretty young girl is taking his pants off,"
Angel said, snorting with laughter.

Sunny narrowed her eyes, and eased the zipper down. Huh. Banana Republic. "You can do
the rest," she said. Angel put his wrists on her shoulders, and stood up, carefully
angling away from her. His hands looked like he was wearing puffy gloves. She held out
the sweatpants so he could step into them. When he collapsed back onto the couch,
she saw that he had no desire to laugh.

"Is there any more blood?" he asked, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back
onto the couch.

She didn't know. The butcher's? She didn't know what to ask for. Sunny got up, 
and then, worried, went out to look in the fridge. There was just someone's lunch
and bottled water. She looked inside the paper sack. Nope, a sandwich.

She came back in. "I'll go get some," she said.

"Thanks," he said, in that low thready voice. His eyes were closed.

"No problem," she said, brightly. She picked up his pants, and put her hand
in the pocket. Ooh, money.

On the way out, she put his pants in the washer with the bloody towels.


It was way past lunch, so she went through the Burger King drive-through
for a Whopper and a shake. The containers of cow's blood shook gently
in their plastic sack on the bench seat beside her. It creeped her that
it didn't creep her to eat fries with two quarts of cow blood in the
truck.

She was going to have to get back to playing softball. Of course, knowing
what she knew, vampires probably ate the pitcher, first base player and
coach, instead of a van wreck.

Once again going in the office side, through the sun, to the dark and
quiet, reluctantly. She knew she smelled of hamburgers and sunlight
to him. She uncapped the first container, and again knelt between his
feet. She held his hands on the container as he gulped it. For the first
time, she noticed how hot his swollen hands were, next his cool wrists.
Poison fever? She would have to start looking these things up. 

Angel was hunched around her, as if she were a space heater. She guessed
she was, to him. "Is there more?" he whispered.

"Sure," she said, and reached back for the other cup, shaking it loose
from the clinging plastic bag. He watched her uncap it, and then took her
hands and guided the cup to his mouth. His thighs were nudging her
waist and she forced herself to concentrate on holding the cup of
blood. Shit. She was kneeling between a dead man's legs. It wasn't right
on so many levels. Again with the not being creeped.

When he had drunk all of the second cup, Sunny started to get up, but Angel
didn't let go of her hands. She knelt there, them staring into each other's
eyes, until her knees hurt. "Let go," she said, softly.

He let her go, and she staggered to her feet. "I'm going to the bathroom."
She hunched her shoulder up under his stare as she turned to leave.

In the apartment bathroom, she thought hard. He couldn't hurt her, because of
the protective spell. And the soul. Interesting that Jack was trusting
both her and Angel. Interesting that Jack knew exactly what to do.
Something was buzzing about in the back of her mind, but she couldn't
get a grip on it. Well, she could hide up here until Jack came back,
but she didn't want to. She wanted to see it through.

Sunny went back to the shop for the hundredth time. This time, she put the
clean towels and Angel's pants in the dryer before going to check on Angel.
He was propped up on a corner of the couch, eyes closed and his swollen
hands loose in his lap. She leaned on the doorjamb. "How are you doing?"

"Stings," he said, without opening his eyes.

Sunny bit her thumbnail, considering. She could put ice on his hands. She
pushed away from the door, and, snagging a couple of dollars of Angel's money
from the desk, went next door. The Espresso Pump barista sold her a couple of
bags of crushed ice without asking why. It was summer, after all. Unlocking
the door, she pulled her tee shirt neck up and smelled. Sheesh. All this
vampire nursing and no shower. She hoped Jack got back soon, from where
ever you went to buy anti-demon medication.

Angel hadn't moved. She stuck one bag of ice in one of the sinks, and
wrapped the other up in a bigger towel. When she carried into the office,
Angel let her put his hands on the ice, but stared at her like she was out of focus.

"Buffy?" he whispered, like before, with that fogged-out look. Sunny reached around 
and got the phone book, to keep the ice from freezing his legs. Then she sat
beside him. "I need to talk to you, Buffy," he said, urgently.

Shit. "Okay," she said, petting his hair. She should have washed it when
she rinsed the blood out. "Keep your hands on the ice." They were yellowing
with the venom, she noted with detachment. Note to self: stay the hell away
from Chardhu demons.

"The things I've done, Buffy---you need to know."

"No, not really," Sunny said, her attention snapping back. He was looking
at her from under his straight eyebrows like a puppy, with those brown
eyes. Buffy, Buffy---Buffy Summers? She wondered. Of Mrs. Summers, who
had....she rather listen to Angel confess his sins than think about that
fuck of a night.

"I killed whole families. For fun. Darla and I killed whole villages. For
fun. To watch them scream, and beg."

"Like Nazis," she said. "Like the Hutus and Tutsis."

"It was all about pain and pleasure, not hate. We killed to feed. We left
survivors to mourn. I don't deserve that you even talk to me. I don't---"

Sunny clamped down hard on his wrists. "Angel. Not Buffy. Buffy's not
here." He stared at her, not understanding. She let go of him, and tucked
her feet under her on the couch. "Fine. Talk to me."

It was Drusilla, and Penn, and Will who bothered him, apparently. He leaned
against her, telling long rambling horror stories about creating the other
vampires. Drusilla, Penn, Will, Spike, Dawson. She frowned. "I thought Drusilla
sired Will. She sired Spike, too?"

"Will changed his name to Spike," Angel said, thrown off his narrative. Which
was fine, because it kind of felt like having Ted Bundy sit with his head
on your shoulder and tell you just how he got the women in his VW. "And
everything they do---"

"Well, Angel, you don't do any of that stuff now, do you? And you're sorry,
right? And you're doing your best to be a good guy, aren't you?"

"I'm not doing my best. I didn't want to go face the Master," 
he said, elliptically.

"Whatever," Sunny said. She didn't know if Buffy Summers ever said that,
or said that to Angel, but the hell with it. "Give yourself a break,
for God's sake. You have your soul for a reason."

"To make me suffer," he said.

"Well, but in the cosmic scheme of things, you have a higher purpose."
It was in Jack's books, and sounded good. Besides, she kind of believed
it.

"Do you think so?" he asked pathetically. Jeeze, he was so whipped.

"Yes," she said firmly. Angel turned his head and kissed her on
the temple.

Okay, fun, but bad touching from the vampire. "I'm going upstairs 
to get my library book," she said firmly. "Why don't you lie down?"

"Are you coming back---" he focused. "Sunny?"

"Yeah, I'll stay with you till Jack gets back with the stuff."

She came back with the books, another Diet Coke, and the rest of
the box of doughnuts. Angel was stretched out on the couch, on his
side, cradling the ice bag. 

Sunny settled herself and her stuff on the floor by his head, and opened her
book. Angel put his hand on the top of her head, tentatively, like he 
thought she would shrug it off. He stroked her hair a couple of times. 
It was exactly the way an old lady had done to her once, when she was 
sitting outside the pharmacy waiting for Jack. Like they were petting 
a cat. His hand stilled, and fell away.

She thought he whispered, Buffy, but couldn't be sure.
For some weird reason, it hurt her feelings.
************************************

Sunny had nearly finished "Shogun" when Jack finally returned.
He looked irritated, and smelled like stale cigarettes and spices.
He stopped inside the office door, and looked at them. Sunny put
a finger inside her book, and met his eyes.

"I want overtime," she said flatly, and stood up. Jack smiled 
at her, and put his arm around her. Sunny pushed her face into
his shoulder, careful not to disturb the grocery sack he held
in his other hand.

"Tough day? Scared?"

"Well, he kept hallucinating and trying to get up. I had to
change the bandage."

"Well, tell you what. You take a break, and go order a pizza. I'll
let you take the Camaro to pick it up. I can do this. We can probably
take Angel to his place when it gets dark." He let her go, and frowned.
"He's wearing my shirt."


Sunny came downstairs, in clean clothes and with eyeliner on. She heard
the television on in the shop, and as she walked in, she saw Angel, 
wearing his own pants and shoes, sprawled on the customers' sofa. He
was sipping at a container of blood.

"So the stuff worked already?" she asked.

He looked up. "I'm still kind of weak, but, yeah," he said. Then he
smiled at her.

Sunny took an involuntary step back. She didn't realize what he looked
like under the beating. "You clean up real well," she said, raising her
eyebrows.



"You clean up real well," she repeated morosely, in the car. 

"You sounded very uninterested," Jack told her. "You can drive faster than
thirty miles. I'd like to get the pizza sometime before dark."

"What do you mean?" Sunny said, panicked. "You think I really am interested?
I'm not interested."

"Good. Because you sounded mildly surprised. I had a crush on the first
vampire I knew."

"Crush. Jack, he kept calling me by someone else's name. I don't have a
crush on Angel." She chewed on her lip. "I'm just obsessively curious."

Jack reached over and tapped her hand on the gearshift. He was very good
about not grabbing at her. "You didn't let him feed from you, did you?"

"It never even occurred to me," she said. "Or him, I guess."

"I'm a rotten guardian," he sighed. "It's like being a contractor on the
Death Star. I should have remembered how it feels to take care of someone."

Sunny cut her eyes at her uncle. "I don't have a crush on Angel."


That's what she was still telling herself at the end of the summer.
After she figured out whom Angel was following around and long after 
she got used to being able to sense him walking down the alley.

Maybe it was the blood, she thought, leaning against the coffee bar in the
Bronze. Having his blood spray all over her when he fell, back at the shop.
She swallowed some, she knew. Her hands and arms had been covered
in Angel's blood, from the re-opened wound and the blood he spit
on her, and whywhywhy is that a tender memory?

He called her Buffy. He thought it was Buffy tending to him. Sunny lowered
her head and scuffed her toe on the spilled coffee splotch. She knew he
was in the building. She could feel *him* in her hands, on the back of her
neck. In fact, at home, she knew when he was downstairs in the shop.

She raised her head. Yes. There was Buffy Summers and Xander Harris. Dancing.
There was Willow Rosenberg, the third member of their constant trio, sitting alone 
at the table, her mouth tragic. And there,
on the other side of the dance floor, was Angel, staring at Buffy.

A Buffy stropping herself on Xander, like Jack stropped a razor.


The music stopped, and Buffy left the dance floor. Xander, somewhat
shakily, went back to Willow. And here was Angel, standing in front of
her, his hands in his pockets, his face perfectly blank. Which meant, she
thought, that he was really upset, and had no expression that wouldn't 
frighten the crowd. "Goin' back to the shop?" he asked tersely.

"Yeah, I guess I am," she said. "Want a ride?"

"Yeah. I want to ask Jack something." 

She put down her cold cup of coffee, and straightened up, digging for
the keys. "You gonna buy that convertible from Jack?" she asked.

He blinked, and his expression eased slightly. "Thinking about it."

Ever the broody gentleman, he put his cool hand on the small of her
back and shouldered their way through the crowd. Sunny looked 
over her shoulder. Xander and Willow didn't even notice. 


#
The slaying business picked up when school did. Go fig; the nights were longer,
so it figured that it was Sunnydale Demon season again. This time,
though, there was a poltergeist in the library--a mischief making one.
It ruffled the card catalog and upended books.

"Principal Snyder thinks its student vandalism," Giles told Buffy.

"But that would be too simple," she said, managing not to roll her
eyes.

"Well, the students who do come into the library are either actually
researching something, or your friends."

"So you think it's really a ghost?"

"It's not really a ghost. It's an unquiet spirit, triggered by an
adolescent girl."

"Well, that narrows it down to only half the entire school."

"Usually, a girl who has been abused or, or, molested." 

Buffy looked up from rummaging in her handbag. "Well, you could figure
out all the girls that come in here, and when this stuff occurs, and then
we could...snoop."

A girl came out of the upstairs section, and walked down the steps toward
them. She was a tall girl with shiny brown hair coming out of a loose 
braid: Sunny, that was, who used to live next door.

Buffy frowned at an elusive memory. Sunny had said, right after school started,
something about...about...

The other girl saw her, and raised a hand. "Hey, Buffy. How's your mom?"

"Good, she's at the Gallery," Buffy said automatically.

That was it. Something about Sunny's mom. Sunny's mother had suddenly moved out
of the house next door, and Sunny was living downtown with her uncle.

Upstairs, there were several crashes, one after the other, like dominos.

"Is anyone up there?" Giles asked over his shoulder, as he sprinted up the steps.

"No, and I wasn't over there. I was up front," Sunny called up. She tossed the
book she was holding down on the counter and left.

Buffy slowly walked upstairs. A row of shelves had collapsed. "Maybe our
suspects just narrowed down," she said, kneeling to help pick up the books.
*

Sunny had given up and bought a copy of "Life on the Mississippi" at the 
off-campus bookstore downtown. She was sitting on the sofa at the barbershop, 
reading it and eating one of the Hawaiian soy burgers. "I can taste the difference," she
muttered under her breath. 

Her uncle turned off the clippers, and stepped back to look at his customer's
head. "Buy whatever you want for your own dinner," he said cheerfully.
The brown and copper Synco demon looked alarmed, but he had been looking 
nervous from the moment he walked in. Well, he was the one with the mullet.

She held up the paperback. "Had to buy this, since I couldn't get it checked
out at school. As usual." Stupid librarian.

"Shouldn't penalize the kid for buying books," said a guy, standing beside
the front door. He nodded to her. "Mark Twain, too. Should get bonus points."
He came inside, unzipping his hoodie. "Have you taken Meena's place? Why
do you look like Jack?" He walked over to her, and gave a long, intent
stare down at her.

Sunny stared right back. "Who the hell are you?" she asked.

"I'm a friend of your uncle's. Well, I was years ago. He's a little
shy about claiming me now." He shook his cup of soda, settling the ice.

Jack didn't look up from his clipping. "Brooks, this is my niece. Jim's kid.
She lives here now."

Brooks took a sip of his Big Gulp. He still looked sixteen, and he was wearing 
sk8tr boy clothes. "Why do I smell Angel?" he asked suspiciously. 
"He's not here, is he?" He moved away, to glance down the hallway.

"No," she said. A vampire, then. And had Angel come and gone before
she got there? Stupid, stupid librarian. "Why do you care?"

"Because Angel kills our kind. He's killing every one of the Master's get that 
he can." His brown eyes lifted to her. "That means nothing to you. Jack, don't
you tell her what she's doing? Who she's talking to?"

Jack said, neutrally, "The Master's dead. Any quarrel Angel, or the Slayer, has
with you is not my business."

Brooks kicked his feet up on to the station. The Synco demon looked nervous at 
the proximity of the vampire; he kept going in and out of human aspect. Fortunately
this did not change his hair. Brooks' dark stare moved back to Sunny.

"Angel kills his own kind," Brooks said again. "So I tend to worry--"

"Do you want your hair washed or not?" Sunny said, interrupting. 

Brooks grinned. "Well, I guess someone with your whiskey colored eyes wouldn't
be the Slayer."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Like my niece is the Slayer. Washing demon hair."
He snapped the sheet off the Synco's neck. "What do you think? Good." Jack 
turned back to Brooks. "Stop trying to stir up shit. You break your board
again? Why are you here?"

"Came to see you, Jack. Meet the little blood, here."

Jack's face did a human approximation of fangface. "Watch your fucking
mouth on my child." The Synco fairly flew out the back door, and Sunny
herself backed up into the hallway, ready to fly up the stairs. She'd seen
Jack get that angry only once, when he came to the house on Revello to get
her. It frightened her and exhilarated her at the same time.

Jack's expression changed. "Actually, it's good that you've run your mouth,
Brooks. If anything happens to Sunny, even if it's not you, I'll stake
you. Just so you know."

Brooks stood up. "I don't know why you're threatening me," he said. "I
get it. You don't want her hurt. Fine. I've never hurt you. I've never
hurt Meena, either."

Jack looked past him at Sunny. "Come here. I want to show you something."
As Sunny walked to them, she saw that Jack was rolling up the sleeve of
his shirt. "See this?" he asked.

She saw Brooks' back stiffen.

"No, what?" She stepped closer. Jack was pointing to a faint white scar,
kind of like a bar bell. 

Brooks put his hand out. "It's a mark," he said colorlessly. He looked
at Jack. "It's my mark." His hand hovered over it as if he couldn't stop
himself from touching it.

Sunny felt as embarrassed as if she had blundered into them kissing.

"Back in the day, we were friends," Jack said. "I was younger and more
stupid than you ever will be. I let him feed from me."

The vampire sat down in the barber chair. "It's a high, for some people.
If the vamp does it right, both of you get something out of it, and no
one gets hurt. Most of us don't do it right. But 
what your uncle is telling us both, if he sees anyone's mark on you, ever,
he'll kill me. Isn't that right?" How odd, he seemed almost embarrassed.

"Yeah. That's right."

"See? Even evil soulless fiends can be useful," Brooks said. He actually
sounded like his feelings were hurt. But he had called her----she decided
she had better ask about it later.

"The reason I showed you," Jack said, to Sunny, but looking at Brooks, "is
that once you do that, you and the vampire are always linked.
Someone as old as Brooks can hide it better."

Brooks' eyelids were lowered, and he picked at one of the Velcro fastenings
on his shoe. "You're an asshole, but you're right." He shifted. "Seriously,
Jack, I thought the soul man only came in on Tuesdays?"

"He's got a date or something," Jack said indifferently. Sunny, who had
been reaching for her Diet Coke, knocked it over. She bent over, face hot,
to wipe it up. When she straightened, Brooks was watching her with bright-
eyed interest. So was Jack.

"What's the problem? He can't do anything to you here," Jack said.

"He can wait for me outside and pull my head off," Brooks said
nastily. "He's only twice my size and two hundred years older. He's been
damned meaner 'n God for months."
*

"My heart breaks for you. You're too easy to read." Sunny jumped out of her skin,
and whirled to look behind her. Brooks sat behind her on the alley railing, 
long legs splayed. "And Sunny's got a crush on Angel, 
who's allll soulful. He's such a pedophile, you might snag him."

"Shut up.” Sunny backed up to the door, and stepped up into the 
Espresso Pump. But no, there was Brooks beside her. Surely he wouldn't 
bite her in front of a packed coffee shop? "I don't have a crush."

He snorted, and put his hands in his pockets. "Relax. I'm just saying, your
family's all fucking alike. Or vice versa. You and Jack. None of
you Collins kids want someone you can have." Brooks grinned, lopsidedly.
"Just like me, or every goddamn vampire I know."

"Who do you want?"

"Not who, what. I want an espresso and a cigarette." He nudged her
with his elbow. "C'mon. I'll buy. Don't be mad 'cause I think Angel's
a pedophile. You're sixteen---"

"Seventeen. Almost."

"Whatever. He's two hundred and forty. Shouldn't be hanging around
school kids." He held up two fingers to the barista. "Espressos."

"Neither should you. Just because you look like one." She picked
up her coffee cup and stopped, brought short by his hand on her
arm. He was looking out of the front of the cafe.

"Back here," he murmured. "Away from the street." 

Sunny followed him to the dimmer back wall, looking over her shoulder.
All she saw on the sidewalk was two girls, walking away, one blonde,
one redheaded.

They sat down at the tiny table, Brooks seeming so normal,
that Sunny got that schizoid feeling again. It was like she was on
a date or something. Brooks was looking at her with his big blue
eyes, messy black hair like crow's feathers tickling his collar and
almost covering his ears, awkward boy's hands on his coffee cup.

"I'm only thirty-eight," he said mildly. "I went to school with Jack, and
with Meena, now that I think about it. Got turned my senior year."

"Why did he get mad when you called me Little Blood?"

"One of the nastiest things you can call a human. Like calling you meat, I
guess. Kibbles 'n' bits. I don't know why, really. People call each 
other sweet, honey, sugar, puddin', dumplin'...except with us, it tends
to come out as a statement of intent."

"Intent to eat."

Brooks put his finger on his nose. "Exactly. I don't know if I meant it
or not, if that's your next question. I say the first thing that's in 
my head. But I'm not a fledge---" he huffed a sigh. "Didn't Jack tell
you anything? Besides how to kill a vampire, or that we're all soulless
evil creatures of the night?" He got his cigarettes out. "Where was I?"

"Fledge."

"Well, fledgling. Like a baby bird. When you first wake up from the 
death sleep, into being undead. Stupid, disoriented---depends on who
sired you. Sometimes you're all there, all at once. Older bloodline, like I had.
If Angel sired someone, they'd be like someone who had been around for
years."

He looked up at her to see how she reacted to Angel's name.

"Why are you talking to me?" she asked, instead.

He crimped the napkin between two long fingers. "I grew up with Jack, and
Jimmy. Jack's the only family I have. He's the only one that remembers
me from when I was alive." His gaze was bent on the napkin he is pleating.
"Vampires killed my family. Well, my sister killed my family, turned me.
She wanted me to run with her, run away from here."

"You say vampire like you aren't one."

"I forget until I'm hungry," he said. He squinted up at the lights. "Or
until its daylight. Or when I have to move." He tore the napkin. "Well,
actually, I do remember I'm a vampire. Just never that thrilled about it.
Can't go to the beach any more."

She fingered the stake in her pocket. Brooks grinned at her.
*

"Mom," Buffy asked at dinner, "what happened with the Collinses? With
Sunny, next door? She lives with her uncle, downtown, now."

Joyce Summers pushed a carrot around with her fork. "I told you, Buffy,
I had to go to court as a witness. I don't think I'm really supposed 
to talk about it."

It was an interesting experience, having her Mom be the one avoiding
*her* questions. "Well, Mom, I don't want to know what happened in court.
I want to know what happened here. I talked to her a few days ago, and
she's kind of---sad. She said she'd trade her car to have my mom."

Joyce looked up. "Really? That's very sweet of her. And very sad."

"Well, what happened to her mom? I swear I won't spread it, I just
want to know...so I don't say anything weird to her."

"Buffy, I'm glad you want to be friends. She's a very nice girl."
Joyce put her fork down. "Apparently, her mother had a boyfriend who
was---I don't know what he was. One night, right after you went to
L.A., he tried to do something. I don't know what. Sunny climbed out
of her bedroom window and saw me in the kitchen. I let her in, and
she called her uncle. He came and got her. I called the
police, but I don't think the man was ever arrested. Mr. Collins 
nearly got arrested, himself, though. That horrible woman did get
arrested."

Buffy's mouth was open. "Her mom was arrested? Wow." It sure sounded
like Sunny was a good candidate for the poltergeist. "I can't imagine
your *mom*..." she trailed off. "I mean, you. You'd kill someone first."

"Yes, and don't forget it," Joyce said briskly. "Anyway, Sunny's uncle
seems to be very nice and very conscientious."

"He lets her drive his Camaro," Buffy said, pretending to change the
subject.

"We won't be talking about driving for some time to come, Buffy. Now,
homework?"

"All right," Buffy groaned. She didn't know if she should sneak out
to the Bronze, now, or not. Probably not.
*

When Sunny came back to the shop, Meenakshi was there, flinging her long
black hair over her shoulders and talking a mile a minute to Jack and
the customers. Above her head, the television was playing a Bollywood
musical, with the sound off.

"Can't we watch HBO?" Sunny asked, shucking off her jacket. "Hi, Meena.
Hi, guys."

"Depends if you got your homework done," her uncle said, draping a hot
towel over the head of someone who had very large, very scaly green
hands. "Don't you have a book to read?"

"I'm so misunderstood," Sunny groaned, and picked up her backpack and jacket 
from where she had just dumped them. "Mark Twain."

"Reading Mark Twain should be a pleasure, not an assignment," Meena
said, frowning. She waved her paintbrush, and accidentally splashed
crimson hair color. "Oh, sorry, Mitch."

"'S okay," said her customer, a slight young demon. He was watching the
soundless Indian movie as Meena painted his hair in red spikes.

"And you should give her book money, Jack! Buying books---it's not like
buying nail polish."

"She gets free nail polish," Jack said mildly. He was using a nail
buffer on the horns of his client.

Sunny whipped around, interested. "Not lately," she said quickly.

*

"When a poltergeist manifests, it uses a person to focus its energies
and, er, transmit or diffuse the energies. I would imagine that the
strong paranormal energies of the Hellmouth make it even easier. It's
not a haunting, but a malicious spirit using the human being as a lens."

Giles paused for breath, and Buffy looked up. "Like burning ants with
a magnifying glass?" she asked.

"Er, rather disturbing, but ah, yes. Like a radio tuner, I think. The
books recommend interviewing the person, and everyone involved with her.
The precipitating catalyst of the manifestation must be---" Giles sighed.
"What triggered the spirit. It could be sexual abuse, or physical or emotional
abuse. Counseling is recommended."

Buffy blew out a breath. "I don't see that happening, Giles. And for all
we know, Sunny's in counseling."

In Giles' office, something shattered. He winced. "Buffy, I have to do something.
It's quite impossible to work, much less research, with things happening."

Buffy picked up her purse from the table. "Giles, though, can't you
chant something and find out for sure? It's kind of ooky for me to just
walk up and say, Did you get the English assignment, and by the way, did
your mom's boyfriend molest you?"

The purse caught on the edge of the table, and her mirror flew across the 
width of the library, to shatter against the wall. "Maybe I can," Buffy said.
Of course, having said that, Buffy felt intensely embarrassed. She thought
about how she felt when anyone asked about her parents.

They had American Lit together. Maybe she could talk to Sunny, then. Ask her
about Mark Twain. Sunny had been nice last week, giving her that ride to the
Espresso Pump. What had she said? Something about trading the driving privileges
for her Mom.

The high school had an earthquake drill during English 3. All the students
dropped below the desk to duck, cover and hold. A stake spilled out of Buffy's
purse and she snatched at it as it rolled to Sunny's knee.

The other girl's face, with those long, long dark eyelashes and amber-colored
eyes looked suddenly different. Like a mask was removed, and the real Sunny,
not the blank-faced A student, looked out. "Huh," Sunny said. "A stake."
Sunny was holding it out to her from under the next desk, blunt end first.
As she reached for it, Buffy was irrevelently taken by the opalescent nail
polish glittering at the ends of Sunny's long fingers. She grabbed the stake.
and pushed it back into her bag. 

She had the strong impression that she need not even try to say anything 
about self-defense. "Wanna talk to you after class," she said. 

"Sure," Sunny said, looking up from under the desk. "You know what? I don't think
this is a drill." The clock slid off the wall and crashed behind the teacher's
desk. "Fucking Hellmouth," she muttered.

Buffy couldn't have been more surprised if Sunny had vamped out in the middle of
the class. The windows rattled, once, and then it was over.

"You know about the Hellmouth?" Buffy hissed, as everyone stood up and began
straightening their desks, everyone talking at once.

Sunny rolled her eyes.

"You don't know anything about this, do you?"

Sunny gave her an uncomprehending look.

"Okay, we so need to talk after class."


But when Buffy sat down with the other girl under the late afternoon
sunlight, she didn't know where to begin. They studied each other. Sunny's
faint smirk made Buffy suddenly realize that wearing a dark bra under 
a light top may not have been a bold fashion statement, but just tacky.
Sunny, on the other hand, wore clothes like the LA girls did, cropped
khakis and Birkenstock mules, a painted-henna anklet, denim jacket that 
whispered "Rodeo Drive". She dressed like Cordelia and sat there and watched
Buffy with the stillness and focus of a vampire. Like one particular vampire.

Sunny said, without a smile, "Short version. Sunnydale is on a Hellmouth, I know
because my uncle knows and makes me carry a stake in my pocket. We're not
supposed to talk about it, because the folks who run this town don't want
anyone to realize that we're all just demon food. You and the librarian and
your buddies are the other people in the school who know. Big secret."
She looked at her watch. "Sun's going down soon."

"What else do--" Buffy collected her thoughts. "That's not exactly what
I wanted to ask you---"

"Oh," Sunny said. She jammed her hands in her pockets. "I won't tell your
friends that your boyfriend's a vampire. With a soul," she added.

"He's not my boyfriend--what? You know about Angel?"

"Hey, I think if people want to date vamps, that's a valid lifestyle choice,"
Sunny said, in a soothing voice that was horribly irritating. "So.
What did you want to talk to me about?"

"There's a poltergeist in the library," Buffy said bluntly.

"Oh. Ghostbusters? Not my gig." Her head snapped up, looking past
Buffy. "My ride's here." She picked up her backpack, and leaped up and
away. Buffy sat on the stone bench, watching Sunny's long brown hair
snapping like a flag behind her.
*

Sunny slid into the truck beside Meenakshi. "That girl that Angel 
likes---Buffy---started asking me---"

"The Slayer," Meena said helpfully, grinding the gears. "Shit. Asking
you about what?"

Sunny boggled at her. "Angel is seeing the Slayer? Can we say, conflict
of freakin' interest? And she's totally shorter than I would have thought."

"He's pretty but not too quick," Meena shrugged. "I'm more interested
in what the Slayer wanted to ask you about."

"I guess I'll never know. I kind of stayed in her face." Sunny poked 
around in her bookbag. She looked up, and sighed. "She said there was
a poltergeist in the library. But why should I care?"

"We'd better ask your uncle," Meena sighed. "I don't deal with the
dead as much as he does." She took the corner sharply. 


"A poltergeist," Jack said. He put down his spatula. “Buffy Summers 
asked you about a poltergeist? This is the girl you used to live next door to?"

"The Slayer, Meena told me," Sunny said, crimping her paper napkin. "And
the one that Angel was having hallucinations about. Okay. What's a poltergeist?"

"Buffy found out about that night," Jack said, answering her
first question. "That last night at your mom's. She thinks your negative
energy is causing the poltergeist activity."

Sunny felt hot from her scalp to her toes. "Why would that be her business?"

"Abused girls trigger that kind of spirit. But it happens where the abuse
took place, not at some public place. Homes, that's where that kind of thing
shows up."

Sunny stared at her dinner plate. "I don't think I'm very hungry,
actually," she said.

"Don't pull that---you just don't want to eat tofu."

"No, I don't." 

Jack shrugged, and reached in the oven. "That's why I got you a pizza."

*
After-game party at the Bronze on Friday night.

Buffy felt itchy. There were vampires at the Bronze. She could tell. She
had a couple of stakes jammed into her waistband, but none of the demons
were doing anything in particular. God, this was nerve-wracking. She'd 
never be able to do this if Willow and Xander came in before Sunny did.

She sighed. She had to do something. Every cup in Giles' office had smashed
around her head.

She saw Sunny talking to a tall guy with broad shoulders and black hair.
For a moment, she thought it was Angel. What's that about? She wondered,
then realized that it was someone else, far too thin for Angel.
She caught up with Sunny beside the stage.

"Sunny."

"Buffy."

"Look, I really wanted to talk to you about the library---"

"I'm guessing this isn't about working the check-out desk?" Buffy got it,
all right, she was getting the signals to back off. Sunny was being
non-attitude, but she clearly wanted Buffy to Back Off.

Damn it, Giles, you couldn't just get plastic tea cups?

"Um, no. There's a poltergeist, and poltergeists smash things up and
destroy stuff, break stuff. It's negative energy, bad spirits. They're 
come from girls our age, who are---"

"Abused. So?"

"So, weren't you---molested?"

"No," Sunny said. Her shoulders slumped. "No, I wasn't, Nancy Drew."
She started to walk away.

Buffy swallowed hard, and grabbed her by the forearm.

Sunny turned to Buffy, her hazel eyes glittering almost as golden as a vamp's
in the lights from the stage. "What?" she asked hatefully. "Is there anything
else about my fucking life that you'd like to ask me? Are we going to 
start telling each other all. Of. Our. Secrets?" She leaned closer, bringing
the Slayer senses on alert. "Of all the people in here, there's probably two
of us that know exactly how many of them are," and she mouthed the next word,
"vampires." She straightened up. "And how many of us have stakes in our
pockets."

Behind Sunny, Buffy could see Angel, looking at them with a concerned expression.
He took a step forward, and Buffy shook her head. 

Sunny turned to see, and stood completely still, looking at Angel. She turned
back to Buffy, the all her anger gone. "This conversation is over," she said, 
just as the band started again. Shaking her head, the other girl forced her 
way through the crowd of dancers. Buffy began threading her way through 
the crowd in pursuit.


*

Sunny forgot nearly everything she knew about Sunnydale after dark, and barreled
away from the crowd in the Bronze, out the side exit, back to the truck. 
She dropped the keys and couldn't find them through her tears.

The soft scrape of a basketball shoe on the tarmac, and warm fingertips touched
hers. She straightened up, her hand and Brooks' on the keys. The blood pulsed in
her ears as she stared at him.

"Good thing it's me. Good thing I've fed," he said, letting go. He watched her
eyes flicker. "I would have you before you took one step."

Sunny shook out the truck key from the bunch, just looking at the vampire.

"This is Jack's truck, isn't it?" he said, knocking on the quarter-panel with
one knuckle. "I recognize it."

Sunny felt tired all at once, and sagged against the truck door. "Just do 
it," she said. She was sick of being played with. Sick of everything. She 
couldn't get to her stake before he bit her. Just let it be done.

"What?" Brooks said, frowning. "I didn't come out here to bite you." He put
his palm on her neck, and leaned over to her. "And I didn't come 
out here to fuck you, either," he said, his mouth brushing against 
her hair as he spoke. He sniffed, then inhaled deeply.

His hand was...warm. She flinched as she finally realized what that meant.

"Go home," Brooks said, and was suddenly six feet away from her, hands in the
pockets of his hoodie. "There's a lot of us out tonight."

He turned his head, sharply, to the right. Sunny looked,
too, at the opening door. When she looked back, Brooks was gone.

Angel stood at the exit under the light. He let the door close behind 
him, and said, without moving, "Everything okay?"

"I'm leaving now," she said, and got into the truck, started it
and pulled it into the alley.

Stupidly, she looked into the rear mirror, but of course, she
couldn't see anything.

That was when she started crying.

When she got home, she went straight into the shop and stood so Meena
could see her. Meena's eyes narrowed, and the demon girl went over to where Jack
was arguing with an Ana-movic kid who wanted his hair dyed to match
his skin. Jack looked around, and with almost vamp quickness, was beside
Sunny.

"Tell me," he said. For the first time, she could hear her dad in his
voice. Maybe not Dad, she thought painfully, but her dad.
*

Buffy took a good look outside the club, then went back inside.
She immediately saw Angel, who gestured for her. Buffy 
walked through the crowd, and followed him to a table against the wall.

"You heard us?"

"Yeah. I don't think she's the poltergeist, Buffy," he said.

"Is that some kind of special vamp skill? And how does she know I'm the
Slayer?" 

He half-smiled. "I suppose it is a skill. It's just that if she was 
manifesting poltergeist activities, I don't think it would be at the
library. The damage would occur where the feelings are triggered. Your
Watcher may have someone practicing magic spells in the library. Like
pranks." He shrugged. "At least, that's what I thought about when you
were talking about it."

"You have good hearing," Buffy said, half-resentfully.

"Yes. It's amazing what I hear," he smiled down at her. 


The next afternoon, after school, Buffy looked up as a tall blond 
man came into the library. He looked familiar, then she remembered 
who he was. He didn't even look at her.

"Mr. Giles?" he asked. 

There was something in his tone that brought out her Slayer, to get up
and stand between the danger and her Watcher. The two men ignored her,
and stood sizing each other up. Like gunfighters, Buffy thought.

"There's enough evil in Sunnydale without you playing with my niece's
head," Sunny's uncle said. "She's been doing pretty good for a kid who had to
jump out of a second story window to keep from being raped." He looked
at Buffy. "I can't believe that first, your mom told you any of that,
and second, that you saw fit to talk about it to everyone you knew."

"I didn't! Just to Giles, because we thought---" She looked at Giles.
He shook his head in a tiny gesture.

"I know what you thought. Whatever you have going on in here, it's not my
kid." He looked at both of them. "I know who you are, Slayer. I respect
what you do. Don't involve Sunny in it." He gave them both a cold smile.
"Not that she would want to go anywhere near either of you, now." He
turned and left, the library door swinging noiselessly behind him.

"That would be Mr. Collins, then," Giles said, in his driest voice. 

"Is he---something? A bad guy?"

"No, on the contrary, I believe he is the man who rescued Angel this
summer, from an ambush. I'm afraid, Buffy, that, er, we were the bad
guys in this instance, by jumping to conclusions. It would be better
if you didn't mention this to Xander or Willow."

"Believe me, I won't," Buffy said. She fiddled a little with the zipper
of her jacket. "He must be one of the guys Angel talks to. You know, when
Angel says he hears things."

"Very likely. Angel must have some sources. I've seen Sunny and her uncle
in the Espresso Pump."

"Giles, do you think I should apologize? To Sunny? Or is she too mad right
now?"

Giles took off his glasses, and looked at the lenses. "Not right now. I
have already apologized, of course. She didn't wish to discuss it."

"I guess I wouldn't, either." Buffy rubbed her nose, hard. "I guess I'll...
go home for now." She wondered if she could catch Sunny at the Espresso
Pump this evening.

She wondered where Sunny was right now.


Sunny was sitting on the sofa in her uncle's empty office making out with
the wrong vampire. The cursor in her brain stopped at that, and
made a footnote: was there even a correct vampire to make out
with? 

But he was such a good kisser. And he couldn't bite her in the barbershop,
with the protection spell in force. He felt nice and clean after the
embarrassment and rage that still made her face hot.

"Brooks," she said into his cool mouth. "Brooks," she said, so she wouldn't
say "Angel."




That week, on Thursday night, Sunny heard Angel as walked through 
the building to find her, all the way  back to the wholesale store. 
She was supposed to be taking inventory, but she'd zipped through 
that and was sitting with her bare feet propped up on the work table, 
trying out different colors of sample nail polish. Not the most 
glamorous pose, but, damn. Making out with one hot---metaphorically---
guy had made a world of difference, she thought. At times, during 
the few days since she'd seen Brooks, she felt like Queen C her own self.

"Hi," she said, glancing up. The pinky toenail was hard to get right,
and she concentrated on that. 

Angel seemed a little nonplussed, and stood, all black cashmere coat
and black jeans, watching her, hands folded on his belt buckle.

She screwed the top of the bottle on tightly, and held out her bare
foot. "There. Which color do you like the best?"

To her total surprise, he actually stepped forward and wrapped his big
hand around her instep. He gravely inspected the colors, while she
wondered if she could develop a foot fetish. "I don't know, really.
This plum color? But your lotion or whatever smells good."

"Oh," she said, pulling her foot away, and peering at the polish.
"That's some kind of clover stuff." She touched the nails to see
if they were dry. "Did you need Jack?"

"No, I came in to talk to you."

Sunny decided that she needed her socks and shoes on, now. She
pulled them on, ignoring how the threads caught in the polish.
"Oh? What about?"

"Why were you quarrelling with Buffy?" he asked.

She was startled again. Her stomach clenched. "None of your business."

She saw him moisten his lower lip, the way he did when he 
was thinking about what to say next.

"Well, it is...sort of. I'm here to help her. To make up---"

"To make up for a hundred and fifty years of happy murdering,
gypsy curse, atonement."

"You know it's not quite that simple, like a bill I have to
pay," he said. "I told you about the other vampires I made. I have 
their crimes to think about, too. I can never really atone
for what I did. I told you."

"I didn't think you remembered," Sunny said, trying her best not 
to sound sulky, just matter-of-fact. "You seemed to think I was 
Buffy," and she really couldn't help gritting that name, "and I left
before you woke up."

"I remember you covered in my blood," Angel said, blunt. "I wouldn't 
forget that." He watched her stomp into her boots. "I knew
who I was talking to. Most of the time," he added, and suddenly
smiled.

She was glad she was bending over and tying her boots. Couldn't
help it if her face was red.

"Buffy doesn't know what you are, or why you know she's a
Slayer."

"Meena told me she was. You kept asking for her, that time. Then you
never said another word."

"What did Meena tell you?" Angel said. He sat down at the table
and began picking up the little bottles of polish and reading the
labels. He shook one. "What's in here?"

"BBs," she said. "To make it mix better or something. Meena told
me that your girlfriend is the Slayer. And can I say, big fat
conflict of interest on your part?"

"You watch too many lawyer shows," Angel said. "Passionberry? Is
that a real fruit?" He leaned one elbow on the table, his long
legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles.

"Yeah. So what about Buffy? Is she going to--" she stopped,
as Angel unscrewed the top, and took her right hand. "Are you
going to--"

"You're right-handed, aren't you?" he said, as if he did this
every day at this time and had his own tip jar. "The thing is, 
Sunny, I told Buffy that you weren't causing the poltergeist." 
He stroked the polish on her pinky fingernail. She focused on
how his hand got warmer, not exactly draining the heat from
hers, but absorbing it. "I told her that your family was clued
in on what Sunnydale is." He examined that finger, and went on
to the next one.

She waited, all of her attention on their joined hands.

He smiled, not looking up from their hands. "So, I started 
wondering what was causing all of it. Could be someone playing
pranks with magic. Could be a poltergeist, but Buffy's causing
it."

"She could have some major issues," Sunny said.

"But I started wondering why Buffy thought it was you," he said,
still in the same gentle voice. "I don't know what did or didn't
happen to you, but I do know that you haven't talked to anyone
about it."

Sunny ducked her head. See, this is what happened when you wished
too hard for something to happen. She'd wanted Angel to concentrate
on her, for once, and here he was, concentrating on this. "There's nothing to tell. Nothing
happened."

"I believe you," he said, looking up. "But what led up to what didn't
happen? I think it's what almost happened that hurt you."

"I don't understand your sudden interest," she said.

"I think I owe you a favor. The tear in my gut healed. Yours hasn't.
I was thinking if you talked about it, even to me, you might feel
better." He took hold of her thumb, his finger stroking the knuckle.
"I know you lost your dad just before school ended."

"He didn't really like me anyway," she said, voicing it for the first
time. "He left me with her, and never had me visit. Put money in
an account for me, just to piss her off. I never saw him too much after
I was about eleven or twelve."

Angel took her right hand, and started with her thumbnail this time.
"So you were with your mom, here in Sunnydale."

"Yeah, and she was always going out. She went to Las Vegas once for
a week, and left me with pizza delivery numbers. She told me I could
pay for it myself, since I was the rich one. Then she started bringing
this guy around." She stopped. "There wasn't anything I could tell
anyone about. Something creepy. And they always were there, you know?
So I started staying at school as late as I could. And when I went 
home, they were always watching porn. And they'd turn them back on
before I even got upstairs."

Sunny stopped again. "They need a second coat," she said. Angel's
mouth twitched in a half-smile, and he shook his head. He capped
the nail polish and put it up, and took her hands in his.
His hands were little warmer than the cool polish on her nails.

"He wanted a threesome. He wanted a mother-daughter...and my mom
tried to talk me into it. And I know her. She wasn't testing the
waters. I'd heard her get her way before. She wasn't going to stop.
So I locked myself in the bathroom, and they got drunk. They started
working on the door, and I went out the window." She sniffled.
"I know it's not my fault, and I know---what kind of person---
I couldn't testify against her. She's my mom---" and somehow
she was sitting in Angel's lap, crying into his neck.

"Shh, shh," he said into her ear, but she knew he didn't mean
it literally; he meant, cry all you want. And why couldn't she turn
off her brain, and the mean little voice that suggested she
knew exactly what would happen when she told him, and what kind
of 'ho gives away her nastiest memories just to get a hug?

I'm officially insane, she thought, taking the tissue he handed her
and blowing her nose.

"I won't drip on you," she said, getting off his leg.

"Good. This isn't washable silk," he said.


She was insane, which, of course, was why she was at the Bronze with Brooks later
that evening, standing on the catwalk and watching the crowd.
"Buffy's here," she said to him, tipping her head towards her.

Brooks shrugged. He kept scanning the crowd, and suddenly seemed
to focus. "Here's something interesting," he said. She turned her
face into his neck and smelled his skin. He smelled like clean
laundry, like the haze around a fountain. She felt him smile. She
was backed against his chest, inside his jacket, and she was wearing
him like a coat. His long arms covered hers, and his fingers were
on her hands. 

Soaking up her body heat, she thought.

It was hard to imagine that he was almost forty. He still looked like
a student, and he still carried himself like the gangly kid he must
been. He seemed to think and react like a teenager, still.
"I'd like to see you on the skateboard sometime," she said.

"Really? Then I'll show you some time. No, look there. There's a very
old vampire in the house." He pointed down to a man with bone-white
bleached hair, in a leather duster over a red shirt. "I don't know who
he is, but he's an Aurelian. He knows I'm in here, too, but I'm really
small fry. Figures me to be one of the minions." At her look, he said,
"Blood. We know when someone is around. Like, my grandsire was turned by 
the old Master. Like Angel's was."

He had his chin on her shoulder, speaking directly into her ear.
She ignored the remark about Angel. "He's watching Buffy," 
she said, suddenly.

"He's here with a couple of his boys, whoever he is," Brooks said.
"See, he's just sent that guy outside." He listened. The blond vamp
moved towards the blonde Slayer. "He's saying that someone is being
attacked in the alley. He's getting her outside." He straightened
up. "We may want to go out the fire door," he said.

"Sounds good," she replied, and he took her hand and they
threaded their way through the crowd and out to the truck.


They went back to the shop, where the few customers and Jack
were watching HBO. Brooks followed her to the back hallway,
so they could kiss. "Left my backpack in the storeroom," she
told Meenakshi, who gave her a "yeah, sure," stare. Brooks
followed her in, and immediately backed her against the closed
door.

"What?" he said, after a moment.

"I have to breathe, you don't," she murmured.

He smiled, and gently nipped her ear. The only heat he had was
from her. It was sad, really. 

"Boy, the living are so much trouble," he said, against her
neck. "Gotta breathe--gotta have coffee--gotta pee--" He breathed
when he talked, and it tickled. He slid his hands inside her 
jacket, and laced his fingers on the small of her back. She 
put her arms around his neck and stroked his nape, under his hair.

"You got a mullet thing going on," she said, raising her face
to his. 

"Uh-huh," he said, and flicked his tongue across her lower lip.
She opened her mouth to his.

God, he was a good kisser. It was like drinking in cool, fresh
water.

He straightened up, and pulled her over to the work table,
with the bottles of nail polish. "Come sit on my lap," he
said, sitting down and pulling her to him. She took his
face in her palms and began kissing him again. He pulled
her hair loose from the scrunchie and ran his hands through
it. He was getting warm all over.

"I want to see your fangface," she said. His face was the
temperature of hers, now.

Brooks rolled his eyes. "Not right now. We'd better get back
before Jack starts wondering what we're doing. I can hear him
talking." He was rubbing her back and shoulders in long, 
slow circles, but his hands suddenly stilled. "Is Angel just
here every day, now?"

She shrugged, concentrating on warming his face. 

He looked at her, sighed, and kissed her, then again, harder.

She sighed, too, but it wasn't the same way he had.

*********************************************************************************


Oh, she was in Hell, Buffy thought. She picked up the sheet with
the class assignments. "Will, I have to research Indian culture
with Sunny Collins." Buffy was incapable of keeping too much from
Willow, but she had only said that Sunny was a suspect for 
the noisy spirit, and not why.

Willow put down her root beer. "Oh. Think she's still mad at you?"

"Shuh, yeah. And since the poltergeist went away, and she's that mad,
that's even more evidence that I--we--were wrong. And? Will? She knows
Angel. I saw him talking to her in the Bronze."

Willow's eyes rounded. "You think she's after Angel? What about the
grr? Does she know? Is she like, a bad person?"

"She knows I'm the Slayer. Like I didn't have enough---Willow, 
chill out. Sunny won't say anything. Angel..." she trailed off.
"Angel said she wouldn't talk. He said he knows her uncle."
Buffy shook herself. "Well, I'm meeting him at the Bronze tonight.
So---" Willow looked sympathetic.


"This seems very open-ended," Meenakshi said disapprovingly.

She held Sunny's class assignment while Sunny spun on the
bar stool in the kitchen. Her eyes were smarting at the chilies
cut up on the counter.

"I think we should do cooking," Sunny said. "Or we could henna
our hands." Meena ignored her, reading the paper.

Jack walked through, and popped a chili into his mouth. His
eyes immediately began to water. "That's...that's good." He
took the assignment sheet from Meena. "What's this? We didn't
sign up for an exchange student." His mouth worked, and Meena
leaned against the countertop, smirking.

"We didn't," Sunny said, horrified. "I have to do a research
paper. On Indian culture. Works out nicely, actually, except
for the research partner being Buffy Summers."

Jack was drinking milk out of the carton. "I like those,"
he said to Meena, wiping his mouth. "Tasty."

"Great role model for the kid," Sunny observed, looking 
critically at her nail polish. "More importantly, it's
Culture Week, and there's a dance at the Bronze. CanIwearasari?"

"Just remember that the Slayer can kick your ass," Jack said,
pitching the empty carton into the trash can. "You're stuck
with her for two school years." He tugged at her braid as
he went out to the landing and down to the shop.

"It would be easier to get between Angel and Buffy if you were
friendly to her," Meena said. She began chopping vegetables 
again. "Not that I think you'll be able to. But you'll look
better if you don't, if you're friendly."

Sunny raised her head, staring hard. Meena adjusted the burner,
and began throwing the vegetables in the pan. "He's been getting
his hair cut here since this time last year. He came here right
after she did. It's not just because he has feelings for her---
he wants to help her."

"Atonement," Sunny said tightly. "I heard the word."

"I'm just suggesting that by being the friend---" Meena suddenly
giggled.

"You knew Jack in high school, didn't you?" 

"We were best friends," Meena said, sprinkling spices. "Knew Brooks,
too. He's not boy-friend material, either. Even before he was turned.
He loves Jack, and he likes me a lot. But then, I'm a demon. I could
snap his neck. I know what he's like with my people, and I know what
he's like here. If he's killing anyone in town, I think we'd find 
out. He doesn't have transportation, so he's not going out of town."

"How did this conversation---" Sunny was silent.

"The only person Brooks has ever cared about is your uncle. His
family was---bad. He used to spend the night at your grandparents'
house all the time. So when he got turned, he came to Jack."

Meena wiped her hands with a dishtowel. Sunny rolled one of the
whole chilies with her palm, not looking up.

"Just be careful. I don't think, myself, that Brooks will ever
hurt you. He tells Jack he's not killing anyone. Fine. But he's
feeding somehow." She nipped the chili from under Sunny's fingers,
and popped it in her mouth. "Just be careful."

"Okay," Sunny said, not conceding anything.

"Because Brooks likes saris."

********************************************************************************


Rules for nice girls on the Hellmouth: don't tease, don't walk alone
in the dark, and oh, God, don't dance with vampires. Don't let them
wrap their arms around you in the back hallway of the Bronze, and don't
let them kiss you for so long that their mouths become warm.

Oh, wait. Sunny was only doing that with one vampire. He had messy
black hair and huge blue eyes and killer eyelashes and faint stubble
of beard and no heartbeat. A nice girl wouldn't let him kiss her and 
imagine she was being kissed by someone with messy brown hair and 
big brown eyes and killer eyelashes and faint stubble of beard, 
and no heartbeat.


"I know Brooks is a soulless demon," Meenakshi had said evenly. "But
so am I, and he's my friend. Don't---"

"Don't what?" Sunny asked, her hands hiding her burning face.

"Don't hurt him." Meena gave her a plastic Ziploc with chilies.
"He can get his feelings hurt. Not easily, but I have confidence
in you." 

"What are these for?"

"When you see Brooks," Meena said, in that tone of voice which
was an eye-roll.

Meenakshi was talking about Brooks, but Sunny was thinking Angel.

The trouble with Angel---channeling movie titles again---the
problem with him trying to be just Jack's friend, or Buffy's
helper in the good fight, or, the big fat liar, Buffy's boyfriend
and guardian angel, too much irony here, is that he had told 
Sunny a whole lot more than he meant to. He had initially thought 
he was confessing to Buffy, she knew, and he was dropping in and 
out of a hallucination, but he meant the lesson for Sunny. All 
the people he had killed, all the victims,
all the pain and pleasure combined in a long muttered narrative. 

He looked like a young guy, even acted dorky and inept with
the small talk, but he was still someone who had raped and killed his
way across Europe, and then, somehow, became good. He was ten times
her age. Why would he be interested in silly young
Sunny Collins? She asked herself. She'd argue with herself that
he was interested in Buffy Summers, but then, Slayer. Super-hero.
Destined by an inscrutable yet wacky Fate to help the Slayer in
her fight against Ee-vil, and why didn't anyone else think that
was weird?

Sunny could have quite long discussions with herself when she 
wasn't at the shop when he came in, when she wasn't staring at
how the right side of his hairline grew faster than the left. When
Angel wasn't sitting in Jack's chair, watching the Indian station,
or unbelievably, the Golf Channel. 

Vampire liking golf. That was just pervy.

She had other things to think about: the horrible fear that one of the
sweet freshmen boys who lurked around her locker would ask her out,
Cordelia Chase stopping her and asking what conditioner
she used on her hair to make it so shiny, Meenakshi teaching her
how to razor-cut, whether to go out with Brooks again.

She wasn't stupid. Brooks still had a thing for Jack; she was the
next best thing for him. Vampires didn't care about gender, vampires
wanted what they wanted. Like the rest of us, she sighed, and
put the plastic bag in her jacket pocket as she loped down the front
stairs.

Brooks was nowhere to be seen as she drove up to the Bronze, and
she knew why, as soon as she stepped inside and felt the familiar
pleasure and pain of seeing Angel with Buffy. Well, hey, she had
a fun excuse to talk!

"Hey, Buffy," Sunny said cheerfully, stepping to where they were
awkwardly not talking. "I have an Indian friend who says she can
dress us up in saris and show us how to cook a Bengali meal, for
our report."

Buffy turned, almost in relief, to her. "Oh, hey, that'd be cool.
It turns out my Mom signed up for an exchange student to visit, isn't that 
lame? But he won't get here until Wednesday." Slightly behind her,
Angel looked gobsmacked. Sunny widened her eyes innocently at him.

Buffy turned her head, "Angel, this is Sunny Collins. She's my 
social studies project partner. We have to do a report on India."

"You've met Meenakshi Chatterji? Who works for my uncle?" Sunny
said helpfully to him. "Dates my uncle, but they don't want to let the
children know," she told Buffy. 

"Uh, yeah," Angel said.

"Grown-ups are so lame," Buffy said.

"See you tomorrow after school, then? You can ride home with me?"
Sunny asked, feeling that her work here was done.

"Sure!" Buffy said, almost too heartily.

Sunny made her way out of the Bronze and to the truck, counting to
herself as she passed the doorman and the yellow lights.

"Sunny," Angel said, behind her. Hey, forty seconds.

She turned around, key in her hand. "Oh, now what?"

He looked at her, his hands in his pockets. "What are you doing?
Bringing Buffy to the store? Meena's a Lakshmi demon."

"I'm trying to pass social sciences, and so is Buffy. We're in 
school, you know. And Meena isn't going to do anything."

He put his hand on her wrist. "Do you think it's funny, having
a demon right under her nose? A big laugh?"

Sunny tried to pull away from Angel, and ended up nose to nose
with him. "Get over it," she said, "I don't think of Meenakshi
that way. She's like--family. She's----she's not bad." She felt
her temper flaming. "You---you should know better! You know
them---no wonder you don't have friends! You don't know what
a friend is!" Her throat ached as if she was screaming, but she
knew she wasn't.

Angel had dropped her wrist, his face going completely blank.

"I'm not taking it back," she said. "Go back to your girlfriend."
She turned her back on him, and got into the truck.
"Uth, jaag, musafir," Meenakshi sang, as she painted
henna in delicate traceries on Buffy's palms. The
girls were sitting around the kitchen island, and
the entire loft was filled with the smells of curry
and marjoram.

"Rise, traveler, the sky is light, Why do you sleep?
It is not night." Meena cleared her throat. "It was
one of Gandhi's favorite hymns. Please tell me that
I do not have to---"

"No, no," Buffy said, "I know who Gandhi was, and
I know that the dancing cobras really don't sing. But
that's about it." She blew carefully on the wet tracings
of henna.

Until Meena began explaining the hymn to Buffy, Sunny
had never really put together that Jack seemed to practice
Meena's beliefs--the vegetarian food, the brass bells and
the statues of Hindu gods; the wooden incense holders, the
Indian calendar in the kitchen. Or he dated Meena because
he was drawn to everything mystical and Eastern.

Sunny thought, gloomily, that she was unusually backwards
for her age. She never even asked what a Lakshmi demon
clan *did* or how what their true faces looked like, if
they actually did have other faces. 

"...really threw themselves on the fire?"

"Well, it was strictly outlawed by the British, but widows
did commit suttee for years. It's the only thing anyone
seems to remember about our culture."

"Not true," Buffy said, waving her hands. "I know that the
Ganges is sacred, and that some people consider all life
sacred, hence sacred cows in the streets."

"The things of the spirit seem to be closer, in my family
culture, than in American culture in general," Meena said
thoughtfully. "But of course, I'm telling you?" 

Buffy glared at Sunny. "Is the term 'secret identity' meaningful?"

"She told me," Sunny shrugged. 

Meena glanced from one face to the other. "One night, you were
in Parklawn, and you were running a nest of vamps out. They
landed in Jack's truck, and we heard them yelling about the
Slayer. We looked up Slayers on the demon database. When
Sunny said a girl at school had stakes in her purse..."

"It all fit," Buffy said. "And Mr. Collins...he cuts Angel's
hair?"

Sunny looked down steadily at her notebook.

"Yes, with the no reflection thing. I've cut his hair, actually,
too." Meena picked up the paint brush. "Ready for the other hand?"

"Sure," Buffy said, holding her palm out.

"All my sorrows are drowned in you," Meena sang....


....and the room shifted. Sunny and Buffy stood up at the
same time. "Oh, crap," Buffy said. "Good to see you walking."

"Who's playing with the fucking chess set?" Sunny demanded.
"Meena! You're here."

Meenakshi put the paintbrush into the jar. "What was that?"

"Well, it could be a mystical chess game being played that
sends us into an alternate dimension," Sunny said, going
to look out the window. "Oh, wait. We did that. Buffy and
I bonded, then vampires broke my back, then some glowy
mystery lady healed me and wiped our memories."

Buffy nodded. "You have a way with words. And this is the
demon barbershop?"

There was a knock at the hall door. Sunny opened it, and
Buffy saw a tall, dark boy with blue eyes. "Everyone's gone,
but us," he said, standing in the doorway. "I was downstairs 
and everyone disappeared."

"Alternate dimension," Sunny said. "Twilight Zone shit." 
She looked over her shoulder at Meenakshi, who shook her
head. "Pretty soon..."

"Now it begins," a voice said in Buffy's head, and 
they were outside. 

Sunny was clinging to the boy.
"Mother-fucking chess set," she moaned.

"You kiss me with that mouth?" the boy said, but that
couldn't be right because, hello, vampire, and Buffy
pulled a stake out of her sleeve and advanced on him.

Sunny pressed herself back against the vampire's chest. "No,"
she said. "You can't kill Brooks. He's our friend."
The vampire stood still, his hands light on Sunny's shoulders.
Sunny's eyes were blazing.

Meenakshi was between them, arms stretched, separating
them. "You and Sunny did this before," she stated, her
black eyes roaming around.

"Yes," Buffy said, stake ready. Then she followed
Meenakshi's gaze, and noticed that they're not in Sunnydale
itself, but on the seashore, under a full moon.

"This isn't a chess game," Meenakshi said, and dropped
on one knee to trace something in the sand. "This is an
old Bengali game. We're not chess pieces."

The waves lapped as gently as a lake, the air unmoving.

"What are we?" Buffy asked. She is the Slayer. Sunnydale
is her town. That is her mantra, and she will not drop
her focus, caught in some other dimension. She clenched
her teeth.

"We're dice," Meenakshi said. She looked around, and picked
up a few pieces of shell and sodden straw. She squinted up
at the moon, and moved the straw.

"You're doing a moon-dial?" Buffy asked.

"I want to see if this is endless night," Meenakshi said.
"If it is, then I may know what game we're playing."

"Which would be what?" Sunny asked. She still stood
protectively beside the vampire.

"It translates as Hearts," Meenakshi said. "Our
hearts." She sat down on the dry sand. "We will spill
the inner secrets of our hearts until they break."

"What, truth or dare?" Buffy asked, dumbfounded.
*

"What, truth or dare?" Buffy asked, face blank. Sunny felt
Brooks squeeze her shoulders slightly, and she moved to sit
down across from Meena, Brooks at her left. After a
moment, Buffy sat down.

"So, what do we do?" she asked.

Sunny leaned forward. "Last time, Buffy and I fought
vampires all night. I didn't remember anything until just
now."

"And Sunny broke her back. A glowy woman appeared and
had me drag her into a puddle of water, and she was 
healed," Buffy said. She put the stake in the sand
in front of her. "We were friends, but whatever
she was said we couldn't be friends."

"So nothing you said or did---you forgot it all, until
just now, when some spell was cast?"

"You didn't cast one, did you?" Sunny asked, picking
up sand and letting it trail through her fingers.
She couldn't look at Meena.

"Are you a witch?" Buffy asked. "God, I hate magic."

"No, I'm not a witch. I'm a Lakshmi demon," Meena
said calmly. She looked at Buffy and laughed. "That's
it. No big deal." Her voice warmed. "Sunny?"

Sunny looked up. Meena stared her down.

"So, what do you do?" Buffy asked.

"Do? I cut hair. My family owns barbershops up and
down the state. They came from Bengal fifty years
ago."

"The moon isn't moving," Brooks said quietly.

Meena looked annoyed, then shook herself delicately.
She turned blue, and long amber claws grew from the
tips of her fingers. She clicked the claws together,
and the heavy scent of spices came from them. Her
eyes were lighter in the pearly light of the moon,
but she was essentially, Meena.

"You have to tell us a secret, Meena," Brooks said,
and for the first time, Sunny saw him look older
than eighteen. 

"I'm in love with your uncle," Meena said to Sunny.
"I've loved him all my life."

"Well---you two are together, right?" Sunny said,
uncomprehending.

"I want to marry him. I'm a demon. I'm supposed to
marry someone like me." Meena bent her head, the 
heavy blue-black hair cascading over her face. "He
will never ask me to marry him."

"What--because you're a demon? Or because of me?"
Sunny asked, horrified.

"No. I just know." She changed back into her human
form, her skin golden once more, and her eyes black.
She raised her head, blinking back crystal tears.
"The moon has moved."


"You know my secret," Buffy said, moving her shoulders
uneasily. "One girl, in all the world, Slayer, blah
blah blah."

"Has a big thing for a vampire," Sunny said. "Once again,
conflict of interest."

"Hi, pot, I'm kettle. We're black," Buffy quoted.

Brooks looked sideways at Sunny.

Buffy stabbed at the sand between her knees. "I don't want
to be the One Girl," she said. "Does that count? I
want to be the Prom Queen and a cheerleader. I want to
have seventeen bottles of nail polish instead of seventeen
bottles of holy water."

"You want to be Cordelia Chase," Sunny said. "You don't
want to spend your time in the library and with Xander
Harris and Willow Rosenberg. You want to be---"

"No---"

"Popular, and have friends who aren't geeks,"
Sunny said thoughtfully. "You're ashamed."

Meena held up her hand. "She has to tell a secret.
You can't cross-examine her."

"No, I'm not. Xander and Willow are my best friends."
Buffy punched more tiny holes in the sand. "I'm in
love with a vampire. I think that's bad enough. My
mom doesn't even know that I'm a Slayer, and I wanna
date a vampire."

"Doesn't everyone?" Brooks asked.

"Moon's moving," Buffy discovered. "And you know 
what? I need to know why I shouldn't stake you.
I can believe that Lakshmi demons don't kill people,
but I know vampires do." She leveled the stake at
Brooks, business end out. "And Angel has a soul,
and I haven't heard anyone say you do."

"Look," Meenakshi said. "I don't know why I'm saying
this, since apparently we'll forget it all again.
But the demon and the man are the same being. Not like
stir-fry, where you can pick out the onion from the rice,
but like a blend. Oil and raw eggs blended make mayonnaise,
and you can't separate them. The magic binds the dead
body to the demon and animates it."

"We're people, just kind of bad people," Brooks said, propping his
chin on his hand. "We have feelings, but we're pretty
much self-centered. Or so I've been told." He gave a mild,
blue-eyed look to Sunny. "What?"

"You are so not helping," she said. "Not the least bit."

"Well, I don't kill people," he argued. "So--"
He rolled his eyes. "It doesn't matter what you tell
the Slayer. She's what she is, just like the mongoose
is what it is. Rikki-tikki-tavi, see? It kills cobras,
she kills vampires."

Buffy was inspecting the point of her stake. "She's
right. You're not helping."

Brooks looked down at his wrists, crossed over his
up drawn knee. "I feed. I don't kill," he looked 
upward, his face still tilted down. "I'm at the
blood brothel."

Meenakshi said something in Bengali.

"Brothel?" Buffy said, balancing the stake in her
hand. "Like, old Western whore house brothel?"

"Pretty much like old Westerns," Brooks said,
picking at a frayed thread on his jeans. "People
get off on being bitten by a vamp. Pay us for it.
We get blood and money." He wouldn't look at them.

Sunny's ears buzzed. People got off on it. That's 
why he wouldn't show her his fangs.

"I never heard of a blood brothel," Buffy said
angrily.

"Shit, no. Why would you? Nobody's killed.
It moves around. Vamps like me---can't
hunt or sick of it or never wanted to be turned
or just too damned confused about the whole
thing."

Buffy looked skeptical, wanting to be convinced,
not daring to be convinced.

"The moon is moving," Sunny said abruptly. All
of them looked up at the sky.


"What about Sunny?" Buffy asked. "Any surprises?"

"No," Sunny said, and couldn't keep the bitterness
away. "I'm the control. Nothing special here. No
interesting secrets, just the creepy family ones.
But, wait. You already know those." She drew her
fingers through the sand, outlining an oval. "I'm
just grateful I don't have any broken bones this
time." She drew a circle inside the oval, making
an eye. "If we all had to fight, I'd be the one
in the middle with my hands over my head."

Sunny sat straighter. "Actually, you know my secret.
I already told you. I wish I had your life."

"You wish you were the Slayer?"

"I bet I'd enjoy being the Slayer, but that's not
it. I want your Mom, and your house, and---"

"Moon," Brooks said.

"...all my sorrows are drowned in you," Meena sang.

Sunny looked around, waiting for something. She 
shook her head, and began chopping chilies.

*

Sunny wrote most of the paper, but Buffy did have
all the resources from Mr. Giles. She didn't want
to go to the dance, since she had an exchange student
in her house.

Sunny walked through the Bronze, swishing Meena's
sari around her ankles. She wore brassy ornaments,
and Meena had made her face up. 

There was a vampire in the crowd, she knew. Not
from that tingle in her skull that meant, Angel,
but because she knew this vampire. 

She smiled at Brooks as he came up and put his
arm around her waist. His fingers were cool on
her midriff, on her hand, as he smiled down at
her and pulled her onto the dance floor.
*************
The seasonal disorders of the Hellmouth continued. Hallowe'en came
and a chaos mage created, well, chaos. Sunny, having an excellent
ability to avoid any authority figure, wasn't involved. The
Feast of All Souls, however, found her behind Buffy Summers and
Willow Rosenberg as Buffy was giving a kiss-by-kiss recap of
the previous evening with Angel.

Okay, Sunny told herself, you knew it was coming. You knew
they were going to be together and---

She ran into the girls' restroom and retched into the sink.

It's when you actually see it, and you know. That's when it
hurts. Daddy's never coming back, and Mommy's never going to
stop taking her prescriptions or dating perverts who try to
brush against you in the kitchen or open the bathroom door,
your uncle won't let you play on the basketball team because
the games take place at night and night is bad in Sunnydale,
and you fall in love with a dead man who dates a super hero.
You can ignore everything until it's shoved in your face and
you have to pay attention.


She was still sitting on the cold radiator when the bell
rang for classes. Willow sped in, red hair flying, wearing
an unfortunate corduroy overall and pink sweater that clashed
wildly with her hair. Sunny had an aesthetic shudder in the
midst of her heartbreak.

Heartbreak? Well, no. Misery. Just misery and nast