Bending of wills

As she stood in her bedroom, putting the last little touch ups to her make up, she could hear her mom yelling up the stairs. Willow had finally arrived. Just as she was about to call down to Willow to tell her to come up, the bedroom door flew open.

Willow bounced into the room chattering a mile a minute. “Oh, my God, Buffy, you look totally hot! But how in the world are you going to get past your mom and Giles dressed like that?” Willow started giggling at the thought of Giles’s face when he saw his stepdaughter walking down the stairs. Even though he had lived in the states for the past ten years, he still acted all stuffy and, well, British.

Willow started to get a bit nervous when she saw the look on Buffy’s face. It was a look of tranquility – a look that Willow was quite familiar with and had long since become frightened of. Whenever Buffy got this particular look on her face, it always meant trouble, and mostly for her.

However, Willow was a bit puzzled when Buffy just calmly stated, “Willow, look outside and tell me what you see.”

Looking at her friend, she said, “I don’t have to look outside to tell you that it is raining so hard that I gave up on an umbrella. All I did was put on a raincoat and made a mad dash for the door.”

Buffy just smiled and calmly walked into her closet. “Exactly, so it won’t look weird at all that I am wearing a raincoat, will it?”

Laughing, she put on her dark red raincoat. As she glanced at her friend’s face, she just had to smile. There was a reason why Willow never got into any trouble: she never took any chances.

It’s a wonder we ever became friends, she thought to her self while walking out the door. But she kept this thought to herself, because while they might not always see eye to eye about each other’s lifestyle choices, they were best friends and would always look out for each other. Buff then turned to Willow and gave her a slow wink. She preceded to gush very loudly, “Thank you, thank you, thank you. Man, you have no idea how much this means to me! I mean, it would just be horrible to have to sit though that play all by myself! Well not by myself, cause their will be teachers and everyone, but, my God, Snyder is just making me go cause he hates me so much!”

Suddenly, a rich baritone voice rumbled from the kitchen, “Buffy, where are you going in this weather?”

“Dad,” Buffy whined in a plaintive tone, “I told you Snyder was making me go to some stupid play at UCS, remember? I asked you to get me out of it, but NOOOOO; you said it would be a good learning experience and broaden me culturally. So here I go, watch me broaden.” She quickly turned to Willow and gave her a quick wink. “I’m just glad that Willow mentioned wanting to see it, but not having enough money. I told her you would pay for both of us if she went with me. Remember? We talked about this last week.” Feigning exasperation, she stamped her foot down, “I swear you never remember anything, unless it has to do with your books.”

“No, no, no, I remember. Just grab some money from my wallet. It’s on the table. I think I have around fifty in there. Just leave me a few dollars for gas, you can have the rest.”

“Thanks Dad!” She skipped over to his jacket and grabbed his wallet. However, when she looked in it, she noticed that there was not fifty in there but closer to a hundred. “Dad, just thought I would let you know you have seventy dollars in your wallet. So can I have forty-five?”

“No, hunny, you can take fifty. Thanks for telling me.”

With a glance over to make sure no one was looking, Buffy quickly pocketed eighty dollars. I know I should feel bad, but he has lots of money. He’ll never know the difference, she thought. And with that, she quickly walked out of the house.

Both girls ran to the car, trying in vain not to get wet. “I cannot believe you lied to Giles like that! And why did you call him dad? You always call him Giles.”

“I know, but if I pretend to slip up and call him dad, he gets so happy that he doesn’t pay much attention to anything else. Sorry I dragged you into this.” She was sorry actually. She tried not to involve Willow in too many of her lies because she knew that Willow did not like lying to her family or anyone for that matter. But tonight was an emergency. She just had to go to this party. If not, she would just die! “Willow, I think this is going to be a night to remember for the rest of our lives!”

Willow was not impressed however. The only reason she was going at all was to make sure Buffy was not alone. As much as she loved Buffy, a high school girl at a college party did not sound like fun. It sounded like trouble.

“Anytime, you know that,” she smiled half-heartedly. She just prayed that the feeling in the pit of her stomach went away soon. Something bad was going to happen tonight. She just knew it.