So Damn Domestic

The sex of the baby will be revealed in the next chapter.
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Three Months Later. BPOV


Today is such a great day. November eleventh, Addison’s birthday. My little baby is turning three today. It’s hard to believe that only three years ago she was a tiny little pink ball of screaming flesh, no hair with gray eyes and an attitude that would put any runway model to shame. And now she’s a cute little girl with dark hair, greenish brown eyes, a screech that can put Dawn to shame and a death glare that can rip the skin off a cat. Well I don’t know if that last part is true or not, but I’m too afraid to test the theory. I mean, what if it works? Getting your skin ripped off has to be a painful experience. I saw the look on Warren’s face, major pain going on.


Today is exciting for other reasons too. Faith doesn’t know this, but her dad is coming back from Boston. He had to leave a couple months ago because of his jobs and stuff, but he’s quitting his jobs, giving up his apartment and he’s coming back here. I talked to him about it a couple weeks after he left. Faith got really depressed when he left because she wants to have a relationship with him but he couldn’t afford to live here, so I offered to get him a place with the Council’s money but he’s just as stubborn as Faith can be and he said he didn’t want to just take the money, that he doesn’t want to be my charity case. So I got him a job at the Council. He is going to monitor the progress of the kids’ training and report back to them once a month. And he’s getting paid enough to afford a very nice apartment here. He said that he likes the car he has, sentimental value and what not. But he’s coming back today and Faith is going to be so surprised.


And there’s another reason to be happy. I’m six months along now, I have a doctor’s appointment next week and we’re going to find out if my baby is a boy or a girl. I would have gotten in sooner but next week is the earliest the doctor can see me. And thank God it isn’t going to be Dr. Montgomery. I don’t think I’d survive another exam by her. I mean what if I…with Faith in the room? She would flip out. So I’m going to someone else. And I just can’t wait to find out if it’s gonna be a little boy or girl. We kept a lot of Matthew’s clothes and stuff and a lot of Addison’s so this baby will have a lot of hand-me-downs, but I can’t wait to go shopping and buy up all of the cute dresses, or jeans and t-shirts.


We’re still in bed right now. It’s only four in the morning. I woke about half and hour ago and can’t get back to sleep. My stomach has gotten so big. I was this big with Matthew when I was nine months along, and I’m only six months with this baby. How much bigger am I gonna get? And it’s not just my stomach that’s big, my face is kind of…puffier then it used to be. My ankles are so swollen I had to buy new shoes and my stomach and breasts have the whole blue veiny thing going on. There are some days I feel like a disgusting freak, but then Faith comes in and makes me feel like the most beautiful girl in the world. But she’s always been able to make me feel like that.


The baby moves around a little bit. He or she isn’t kicking, just rolling over. I smile and gently rub my stomach. I’m lying on my side, I’m wrapped around the extra pillow I bought a while ago, and Faith is holding me from behind. At least she’s trying to. My stomach is too big for her to wrap her arm around so her hand is resting on my hip. I wish Faith were awake so she can feel this too. This baby doesn’t move around a whole lot. For some reason he or she is very…quiet. Matthew liked to kick and move around and he’d rub his hands against my stomach and it was always a little creepy because I could see his fingers as he dragged them down my stomach. And Faith told me that Addison was always more active when there was food around, either when Faith was eating or just smelt something she wanted to eat.


But this baby is calm, peaceful. The only time he or she ever really moves around is when I’m upset. That’s when the kicking starts. And I’m not talking about a little kick that I get excited about and one that someone else can feel if they put their hand on my stomach. Nope, I’m talking about a nice, slayer strength kick to one of my kidneys. And it hurts so damn bad. It’s like the baby is trying to say ‘calm down before you have me now!’ And I do, calm down that is. When he or she starts kicking like that I always calm down because the last thing I want to do is upset one of my babies. But every once in a while it’ll roll over onto its other side. I hate referring to my baby as ‘it’. I can’t wait until I find out whether I’m having a boy or a girl.


I hear Faith snort a little loudly and it hurts my ear and she rolls over onto her other side. She’s not touching me any more. Her butt isn’t even pressed against mine. Great, now I feel all…abandoned and alone. I hate pregnancy hormones. I turn around very slowly and look at Faith’s back. I’ve always liked her back for some reason. The muscles are very toned and her skin is so damn soft. I love giving her back massages just so I can feel her strong back. And before we had Matthew she used to do this weird thing during sex, she’d roll her back or something and it would always make me scream, but in a very, very good way.


She has a weak shoulder though. Her left one. It doesn’t take much to dislocate it, especially when she fights a really strong demon. I’ve popped it back into place so many times over the years I’ve lost count. But she’s used to it, it doesn’t hurt her much, mostly because of the slayer healing. I love fussing over her when she’s hurt or sick. And she always hints at me putting on one of those sexy nurse outfits, but I won’t. I just like taking care of her, helping her get better. It’s hard to explain so I’ll stop trying.


I look over at the door when I hear it slowly creak open. I see Addison standing there and she looks a little…disheveled. Her hair is sticking up all over the place and she has some dark circles under her eyes, like she didn’t get a lot of sleep. She slowly walks into the room and over to my side of the bed. I close my eyes before she gets to me because the last time she walked up to me like this and my eyes were already opened it scared her and she screamed a little and I don’t want to wake Faith up. I feel Addison put her hand on my cheek and she pushes on my face a little.


“Mommy,” she whispers and taps on my cheek with two of her fingers. I play along and flutter my eyelashes a little bit before I open them all the way. I look at her and smile but she doesn’t smile back. She has a very serious look on her face. I reach up and hold onto her hand and give her a questioning look but before I can open my mouth she starts talking again. “I haded a accident.” I can barely hear her she said it so low. I look down at her pajamas and she’s right, she had an accident. And now that I’m aware of it I can smell it. Yuck. But she looks like she’s about to cry. She gets so embarrassed about this even though it’s not her fault. I sit up and put my legs over the edge of the bed and gently stroke her hair.


“It’s ok baby. Let’s go get you cleaned up ok?” I ask and she nods her head. I give her a kiss on top of her head and hold her hand as we walk out of the room together. I take her into the bathroom and turn on the light and regret it as soon as I do. Were these light bulbs always this bright? After my eyes adjust I run a bath and help her take off her wet clothes. Faith usually gives Addison her baths because my stomach is too big and it’s hard for me to reach over and wash her. It’s just another thing fat-Buffy can’t do. But I manage to find a position that allows me to reach over the side of the tub.


“Addison, it’s ok baby,” I tell her and caress her cheek. She’s still really embarrassed by this. I can understand why, but it’s not that bad. And no one’s ever teased her about it so I don’t know why she gets this bad. “You needed a bath anyway, remember? You wanna look pretty for all of your guests that are coming to your birthday party, don’t you?” She nods her head yes and relaxes a little more. We have a few people coming over. The scooby gang, and Xander’s bringing his daughter. Katie has to stay because she can’t get any time off from work. Brad and his parents are coming, and Kim and her kids. And Faith’s dad is going to show up. It should be a pretty good turn out. We’re having it outside because this town never gets any rain and it’s sunny almost all year long. ‘The perfect town for the perfect family’ that should be it’s slogan.


“Mommy, am I gonna go ta daycare now that I’m turnin three?” she asks and washes in between her toes. That’s a good question. We haven’t put her in daycare yet. We were going to wait until her hair grows back in that little spot. It has a lot but it’s still pretty off and she still wears her hats whenever we go somewhere. But I think she just likes them. Faith has convinced her that the Boston baseball caps are the coolest ones and Addison wears those the most because Faith likes them so much. They fight a lot now, it’s pretty insane, but Addison looks up to Faith so much, I just wish Faith could see it.


“I don’t know, baby. Do you want to go to daycare?” I ask and wash her back with the loofah. She’s quiet as she thinks about it. I’d like her to go to daycare. I mean, kids who go to daycare do better when they move on to kindergarten because they’re used to that type of environment. I almost feel kinda bad for not having Matthew go. But then again he did great in kindergarten and I have a lot of memories I wouldn’t trade for the world. So I take it back, I don’t feel bad for not sending him to daycare.


“Yeah, I guess. I’m gonna be a big sister, I need ta go to school so I can be smart enough to teach my baby stuff.” I smile and have her tilt her head back and I wet her hair and then lather it up with the shampoo. “And I’mma big girl now, and big girls go ta school, don’t they Mommy?” she asks and washes her arms and underarms.


“Yeah they do, baby. But why don’t we wait until after Christmas to put you in daycare. How does that sound?” I want to get her enrolled after the craziness of the holidays, and because I want a little more time with her. I’m used to having her around all the time. She helps me bake and I read to her and we garden together and she helps me with the household chores. I’m going to miss having her around and it’ll take a lot of time to get used to it. Call me selfish but I want some more memories before I send her off to daycare.


“That sounds good,” she says and washes off her chest and stomach. “I wanna talk ta Brother about it first.” Matthew is like a god to her or something. His opinion matters more then anyone else’s. Are all younger siblings like that? Was Dawn like this with me? I have no idea. But even when she was a little baby she’s always responded to him more then she has us. I don’t know why but I’m not complaining or anything. At least she has someone to talk to, someone to be there for her and she doesn’t feel alone. I think that would break my heart if she felt alone. Ok, enough thinking about depressing stuff I have a birthday party to get ready for.


FPOV


“Mama.” No, I don’t wanna go to school today. Tell my teacher I have Lupus, that’s believable, right? I groan and roll over on my other side, facing away from the little annoying person who’s trying to wake me up. “Mama, wake up.” No. I groan again and pull my pillow over my head. “Mama, Mommy said you have ta get up.” I groan again and kick my legs. I hear her sigh and shift around. “Fine, I’m gonna have to sit on you until you get up.” What? What the hell did she say? Ow, oh God, she’s sitting on my back. And now she’s bouncing up and down a little. This is just great. I bet Buffy put her up to this.


“Your mommy is insane, go watch T.V. or something.” But I guess it comes out too muffled for her to hear ‘cause she says a little ‘what’d you say?’ and she giggles a little bit. I pull the pillow off my head and try not to move around too much or else she’ll fall off. “I said ‘your mommy is insane, go watch T.V. or something.’” I hear her sigh and she stops bouncing. I feel her slide off of me and she lands on the floor with a light thud.


“Fine,” she says and runs out of the room yelling. “Mommy, Mama said you’re insane!” Great, now B’s gonna come in here with her insane pregnancy hormones and be crying and upset and we’re gonna fight and it’s all because she’s insane. But that doesn’t happen. Nope, Addy comes back in and crawls up on the bed, with tears in her eyes but she’s trying not to smile so I know she’s faking it. This kid can conjure up tears like nobody’s business. If she’d get rid of the smile she’d have a perfect pout. “It’s my birthday, Mama. Don’t you care that this is the day I was born?” And now B’s feeding her stuff to say, great. I sigh and roll over onto my side and look up at her.


“Tell ya what,” I say and gently wipe away the tear that just fell. I look over at the clock. It’s eight thirty, I’m usually up by now but I’m really tired. B was kickin a lot in her sleep last night and I didn’t get a whole lot because of it. “Let me sleep for one more hour and then I’ll get up and care, ok?” I ask and she thinks about it. She jumps off the bed and runs out of the room and she doesn’t close the door. That means she’ll be back. I roll over onto my stomach and close my eyes. I drown out all the sounds that are comin from the kitchen. I can hear B tryin to make breakfast and it smells pretty good. She hasn’t burned anything yet. At least it doesn’t smell like it. And then I hear little footsteps runnin in the hallway and Addy makes another appearance. I guess she talked it over with B and they’ve come up with another way to try and get me up. She jumps on the bed and stands on my butt and yells really loud.


“‘The wonderful thing about Tigger is tiggers a wonderful thing! Their tops are made of the rubber, their bottoms are made of the spring! They’re bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy. Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun! But the most wonderful thing about Tigger is I’m the only one. IIIIII’mmmm, the only one.” Then she hops down and gets right next to my face and says, “Gerrrrr.” I look up at her and she’s smiling. The Tigger song is far from a last resort. If I send her out again she’ll just come back with some other plan. I reach out lighting fast and hold her down against the bed and tickle her mercilessly.


“You think you’re a big, tough Tigger, huh?” I ask and she screams out ‘no, Mama’ between her laughing. I smile and keep on tickling. “Well come on big, tough Tigger, bounce away.” She’s kickin and grabbin my hands and squirmin around and tryin her best to get away but I have a pretty good hold on her. Then I stop and before she has time to recover I lean down and give her a big kiss on the cheek. “Mmmmwah!” I say and pull back and there’s a loud ‘pop’ sound. “You’re not a big, tough Tigger, are ya?” She nods her head no. “No, you’re a big, tough three-year-old.” She giggles and nods her head yes. And then we hear:


“Faith! You have two minutes to get up or I’m coming in there!” And trust me that isn’t a good thing. I look at Addy and roll my eyes and whisper ‘crazy woman’ and she giggles a little bit. We get up and leave the room and I close the door behind me. We walk into the kitchen and Addy runs over to the table and sits down next to Mattie and starts talkin to him. I walk over to B. She’s standin at the stove, stirring the scrambled eggs. Well, I guess it would be scrambling the scrambled eggs. I lean in and give her a little kiss on the cheek.


“Hey baby, you look great this morning,” I tell her and she smiles. She does look great. How long has she been up? She’s already had a shower, I can smell her shampoo, she’s dressed in a really pretty sundress, her make-up is flawless and she looks very well rested. She has this little sparkle in her eyes that only happens when she’s had a good night’s sleep.


“Thank you, baby,” she says. I walk over to the platter of toast and English muffins and reach for one. “Ah, ah, ah. Faith, you have to wait until breakfast is ready.” I guess one of the kids already tried to snag one or else she wouldn’t have said that. If I had eaten on then whoever had been whining would have said ‘how come she gets one?’ ‘Cause I paid for ‘em, that’s why. But I can’t say that so I’ll just starve until breakfast is ready. “Baby, why don’t you go outside and set up the tables?” Since Addy’s birthday party is going to be here we decided to go out and buy these really cool foldable tables. One full sized table for the adults and one miniature table for the kids. We bought ‘em a couple weeks ago but we still haven’t taken ‘em out of the boxes.


I give her another kiss and go out to the backyard. Tucker’s out there already and walks up to me wagging his tail and panting a little. I talk to him a little and pet him on the head for a little bit. I sit down at the table and light up one of my cloves. Yeah, I’m smoking again, so what? I need this to deal with all the crazy shit that happens around here. And I’m talking about the regular craziness. Addy’s starting to fight me on almost everything. Not one day goes by where we don’t end up yelling at each other, and she’s only three. I’m actually afraid of what’s going to happen when she’s a teenager. I was a little hell raiser, is all that gonna come back to bite me in the ass? God I hope not. I don’t know how I’m gonna deal with that if it happens.


“I think I’d probably go insane,” I say to Tucker is scratch behind his ear. “Then again I’m talking to a dog so I might be there already.” I smile and exhale a long line of smoke. I watch as it swirls around and then disappears into nothingness. I wonder where the smoke goes when it disappears like that. I mean, it has to go somewhere, it can’t just become nothing. Hmm, another one of life’s little mysteries I guess. I take the last drag and stamp the cherry out in the ashtray and exhale slowly. “Well, better get started on those tables.” I stand up and Tucker walks off. I hear the neighbor’s dog start to bark and Tucker runs over to the fence and starts barking too. I try to call him back but he won’t listen. Oh well, I’ll wait until B gets really irritated, then I’ll do something about it.


Now to get to work. I walk over to the two large boxes and rub my hands together. I open ‘em up with a little difficulty. Damn, they don’t make tape like they used to. This shit is harder to rip. Did the find out about slayers and how strong they are and then put out a product that makes it annoying for us to try and rip it off? Hmm, this should be investigated but later. If I stop now then B’ll get pissed. So I get the small table out first ‘cause it’ll be easier to set up. It takes me about fifteen minutes because I didn’t know this would be fuckin complicated. It’s a fuckin table, they can just have the legs fold. But now, they had to involved screws and aligning things just right. If I had known it would be this much work I would have suggested moving the party to the park, or some type of kids place thingy in Vegas.


“Faith, are you finished yet?” I hear B call out through the kitchen window. ‘Does it look like I’m finished?’ That’s what I think but I’m not about to say that shit out loud. Normally I would, but normally B isn’t pregnant and right now she just can’t take a sarcastic remark. “Breakfast is ready when you’re done.” Meaning: don’t in here until the tables are set up. So I spend half an hour setting up the large table. I don’t know why this one is so fuckin hard. I mean, it’s just a fuckin table. I can slay demons and dust vampires and deal with insane pregnant women, but I can’t set up a fuckin table? What kind of shit is that? Unless this is an evil table. Yeah, that’s gotta be it. It’s an evil table sent up from hell to give me a migraine. Well, its evil scheme is working.


Ok, time to take a little break. I put the screwdriver down and light up another clove. I don’t really need to take a break but the longer I’m out here the more I can smoke, the more I smoke the calmer I’ll be. Buffy will be pissed but she threw the biggest hissy fit when we ran out of paper towels yesterday so I’m not too worried about it. If it’s not me that pisses her off it’ll be the fact that the couch doesn’t perfectly match the carpet or some shit like that.


“Mama, what are you doing?” I heard Addy ask from the doorway. Fuck, busted. I wanted to finish enjoying this one before I got caught. B knows that I’m smoking again, but she doesn’t want the kids to see it. She walks over to me and sees the cigarette. Well, she already caught me doing something, might as well finish it since this is gonna be the last one of the day. “Are you smoking?” I nod my head yes and take a small drag. “Mommy says it’s not good ta smoke ‘cause you get cancer and die.” I try as hard as I can not to roll my eyes. B only told her that so if I ever got caught she could send me on a first class guilt trip.


“Addy, I’m not gonna get cancer.” I probably will but that won’t be for a long time. We’re all gonna die some day, this’ll just speed up the process. “Your mommy just doesn’t want me smoking anymore.” She looks like she doesn’t believe me. And with good reason. I did just sort of lie to her. “So, are you excited about your birthday party?” I ask for a desperate subject change. She sighs and sits down next to me. I take the last drag and stamp the cherry out on the porch and toss the butt in the ashtray up on the table.


“Yeah. I’m three now, and Mommy says I can go ta daycare now. But I’m not gonna go ‘til after Christmas.” So, we are going to put her in daycare after all? I guess it’s for the best. I mean, we’d have to do it anyway once I get a job and B goes back to school. If Addy is in daycare then B won’t have as much stress to deal with while I’m gone. She’s never really taken care of a little baby and a preschooler all by herself before. Mattie was already in school when Addy was born and this was back before we had career goals.


“Faith, you better come eat some breakfast or I’m giving the rest to Tucker!” I hear B yell. Fuck, make up your damn mind. First she basically says ‘don’t come back in ‘til you’re done with the tables’ and now she’s saying ‘eat before I give it to the dog’. I think the day Buffy truly makes up her mind about something, as in she’ll never change it ever, they’ll be a fuckin parade or somethin. Or hell will freeze over or some type of large, fat animal will learn how to fly.


BPOV


“Hey Xander,” I say and try to look over the large mound of presents he’s carrying. He can’t see over the very top package and I can hear Miranda behind him, guiding him along. Then I see her run forward, carrying a little box that’s wrapped in really bright pink baby with little birthday balloons all over it, and there’s a pink bow on top. I would lean down and give her a hug but my stomach is too big for that. So I stroke her hair instead. “Hey there beautiful. How’s my favorite niece doing?” She smiles and giggles a little bit.


“Aunt Buffy, I’m your only niece.” She gives me a big hug as best she can because of my fat stomach and she runs off to play with Addison. Miranda is only a year older then Addison, but that is a big difference even though it doesn’t seem like it. Their minds are developing different, Miranda can grasp concepts about the things around her that Addison can’t…ok, enough psych 101. I hated that course no need to start bringing it up now. Anyway, even though Addison can’t understand as much as Miranda can they still play together pretty well. Neither of them is shy so I guess that helps.


I take some presents from Xander and carry them out to the backyard. The two picnic tables that Faith set up are going to be the ones we eat at. We’re having a bar-ba-que to help celebrate Addison’s birthday. And I’ve been having this huge craving for bar-ba-qued ribs so it made sense. The presents are going to be put on the little patio table. So Faith is going to have to find somewhere else to smoke if she decides to today. I know she’s already had at least one. I could smell it on her and Addison snitched like most little kids do. Faith got a little mad and started to rant but she stopped when she saw how pissed I was getting. Little kids snitch, it’s just what they do. Faith shouldn’t be yelling at Addison for doing something that every single little kid does.


I look at my nice backyard and see Miranda and Addison chasing Brad. Poor little boy. Those girls are going to gang up on him and he’ll be so traumatized. The O’Keefe’s got here about half an hour ago. Addison’s been pretty good so far. She hasn’t embarrassed him too badly. Matthew’s out there too so she’s more interested in impressing him then she is in tormenting Brad, but now that Miranda is here that’s all about to change. My little girl, the three-year-old man-eater.


Faith is still freaking out a little bit. She’s worried because of Willow’s playing-doctor-comment that she made a couple months ago. Ever since then Addison and Brad haven’t been in a room alone together. Even though Addison has to keep her bedroom door open during the day Faith shadows them around. She doesn’t want to give them the opportunity to do anything bad. But, come on, they’re three. It’s not like they’re gonna do anything really bad. They’ll strip, check each other out a little bit, ask some questions about what they see, get dressed and feel a little guilty about what they did and never talk about it again. Ok, so I am speaking from experience here. When I was six I had a play date with a little boy I went to school with. His mom was in the kitchen and we were in his room coloring and I was curious.


“Connie, Dan,” I say getting their attention after all of the presents are put on the table. I stand next to Xander. “This is my friend Xander. Xander, this is Connie and Dan O’Keefe, the people that live next door. Their son is the one being chased by the girls.” We look out into the yard and Brad is climbing the ladder to the tree house. I see Matthew kind of standing off to the side and watching as the girls climb up after him. He has this look on his face like he’s preparing himself for one of them to fall. He has really good reflexes because he’s a slayer. If one of them falls he’ll be quick enough to catch them. Strong enough too. But that doesn’t stop me from worrying that one of them will get hurt. But I’m a mom, that’s part of my job.


“Hey Xand, when did you get here?” Faith asks and walks down the step from the backdoor and gives Xander a big hug. She’s been in the bedroom most of the day, talking on the phone. She wouldn’t tell me with who. She ended up locking me out of the room when I wouldn’t leave her alone about it. And I had other things to do anyway so it’s not like I sat there at the door trying to eavesdrop...for every long. Ten minutes at the most but then I had to go outside and get the rest of everything set up. I got the birthday theme table clothes and the plates and napkins and cups out. Put up the streams and filled all the balloons with helium. It took longer then you’d think because I have to pee like every five minutes. At least it seems that way. I can’t wait to not be pregnant.


“Baby?” I say and Faith gets this expression on her face like ‘what now?’ Ya know not everything out of my mouth is going to be me asking her to do something. She acts like I never do anything around this house and I have her to every damn thing. And yeah, I’m gonna ask her to do something, but that is so not the point. “Now that people are starting to show up why don’t you start fixing the ribs?” She gives me a little smile and nods her head. “I’ll go ahead and make the salad. There’s sodas and bottled water in the cooler over there,” I point to the cooler that’s up against the side of the house. “And we have chips and stuff in the house if anyone’s getting hungry.” I hear the doorbell go off and Tucker starts to bark. “Excuse me,” I say very politely and answer the door.


“Hi Buffy,” Kim says and gives me a little hug. I hug her back and when we pull apart I look down at her two kids. Lindsay is Matthew’s age, and she’s part of Matthew’s little group of friends. Dean just turned two and he’s one of the cutest little boys in the world. Bright blue eyes, light red hair, and fair skin. And he’s pretty shy too. I hope he doesn’t feel too overwhelmed by how many people are going to be here.


“Hey, glad you could make it. Come on in. Everyone’s out back. Just put the presents with the rest of them on the table out there. You can just go on out, I need to use the restroom.” She says it’s fine and I watch as they walk through the living room and head towards the kitchen. I walk into the bathroom and get the eye drops out of the medicine cabinet. One thing that happens during pregnancy that most first time moms don’t know about is the dry eyes. When you get to be about six months along your eyes can become sensitive to light or get really dry. Mine get really dry and I have to do this usually seven times a day. The doorbell rings again and I go out to answer it. As I’m walking by the kitchen I hear Xander and Faith laughing. Hmm, I wonder what they’re laughing about? I guess it doesn’t really matter. What the fuck?


“What the fuck are you doing here?” I didn’t mean to say it that harshly but whatever. They don’t need to be here. They weren’t invited. “You weren’t invited, what are you doing here?” I watch as they give each other this look, like ‘wow, look at the crazy pregnant lady’. I wanna kill ‘em both. “Well?” I ask and they both stand up a little straighter and shift around a little bit.


“We were invited. Faith didn’t tell you she invited us?” Kennedy asks. “I talked to her earlier. We’re in town tracking down a demon and I called up Faith to see how she’s doin and she said we should stop by, see the fam. She didn’t tell you?” I wanna smack that smug look off her face, but I can’t because Matthew just walked into the room. I guess Kennedy either heard him or sensed him because she looks passed me and she gets a big smile on her face. “Oh my God, you’ve gotten so big.” Yeah, well the last time you’ve seen him was, what? Three years ago?


“Aunt Kendy?” he says and walks up to us. I want to say something to make her go away, or make Matthew go away so I can yell at Kennedy but I don’t. Nope, they were invited after all, it would be rude of me to send them away. I look over at Cordelia and she’s smiling too. I have to admit it is kinda, sorta nice to see them again. It’s been a really long time since Faith and I bumped into them in Vegas and it’s nice to know they’re doing ok. Even though I don’t like either of them. Ok, I know I have issues and I’m holding onto a lot of anger that I probably shouldn’t be holding onto, but I can’t help it. Willow was broken for so long, and she’s getting better now. So seeing the thing that broke her is very…upsetting.


“Hey, little man. How ya been?” she asks and he tells her he’s doing fine. I stand aside and let them in. So Kennedy thought Faith was going to tell me, she thought she would be welcome, so this isn’t her fault. I might as well go to the source on this one. So I let them in and they go out to the backyard. Xander is a little…reluctant but he welcomes them and I introduce them to everyone and then glare at Faith. She’s concentrating on bar-ba-queing at the moment and she’s not looking at me on purpose. I walk up to her and just stand there. I cross my arms over my chest and tap my foot a little. She looks over at me and smiles a little bit. I wanna smack that smile right off her face.


“What the hell where you thinking when you invited Kennedy to our daughter’s birthday party?” I ask and oh yes there’s plenty of venom in my voice. She grabs the tongs and turns the ribs over and takes another drag of her cigarette. I am getting so sick of her smoking. She always smells really bad now, and no matter how much gum she chews I can still taste it. So I reach over and grab the cigarette out of her mouth and toss it to the ground and smash it out with my foot. “Stop avoiding my question.” She looks pissed but I don’t care.


“I thought it would be nice to see her again. She was my best friend for almost a decade. And I didn’t tell you ‘cause I knew you’d overreact just like you’re doin now. I know you have some problems with her but now isn’t really the time to get emotional about it. Her and Red are fine, they talked, they worked it out and they’re all nice and moved on. I really don’t see a problem with her or Cordelia bein here. The kids love ‘em.” I look over at my babies. They’re talking to Kennedy and Cordelia like they’re the most fascinating people on the planet. “So please, just relax and try to enjoy today. If not for me or them, then for Addy. Please, don’t ruin her day by makin a big scene.” Great, now I feel all guilty and shit.


“You’re right, baby. I’m sorry. I just get so mad when I think about how hurt Willow was. But you’re right, she’s moved on now. All these hormones are makin me kinda crazy.” It wasn’t the hormones but they’re a perfect scapegoat. I lean in and give her a little kiss on the lips. Ew. Her lips taste so nasty because of those damn cigarettes. “Faith, no more smoking, ok?” She nods her head yes but she has a look on her face, I can’t really describe it, and I know she isn’t going to listen to me. But if she knows what’s good for her she will. Well, if she plans on getting any in the next three months she’ll listen. I’m normally not as commanding about things, but I really don’t want her to smoke anymore.


I look over at the backdoor when I hear someone walk through. I see Willow and Giles, both holding very large gift bags. They smile at the kids and then set the presents on the table. I tense up for a second when Willow sees Kennedy. She looks surprised to see her, but that’s expected. I’m expecting there to be some sort of fight, or for Willow to storm off. She was with Kennedy for…I can’t remember exactly how long, and then she just leaves her for Cordelia? If I were Will I don’t think I’d ever be able to look at Kennedy again.


But she’s fine. She smiles really wide and gives her a big hug. When she pulls away she waves to Cordelia, but they’ve never been big with the hugs so it would’ve been strange if they had hugged. I guess Faith is really right, Willow has moved on and is doing better now. I hate it when Faith’s right and I’m wrong. I’m gonna go find something sweet to eat. I could use a little pick me up now that I feel like dirt for being so mean to Kennedy.


FPOV


“Happy birthday dear Addison, happy birthday to you!” Everyone sings out and she waits a couple of seconds to make her wish. Then she blows out all the candles and everyone claps and cheers and she has this big smile on her face. We figured we’d have the cake first and then once we get the kids cleaned up a little bit then we’d let her open her presents. We learned this lesson on Matthew’s first birthday party. We let the kids open the presents first and then we had cake and a lot of the toys got covered in white and blue frosting.


I look over at B and she’s taking lots of pictures of our girl. I can’t help but smile as I take the candles off the cake. Everyone finally got here about half an hour ago. We had plenty of food left so we waited for them to finish lunch before we brought out the cake. Dawn and Kyle showed up about half an hour after Kennedy and Cordelia. Dawn was a little pissed at first but I think it’s just the pregnancy hormones gettin to her. And damn, Dawn’s stomach has gotten big since the last time I saw her. She’s as big as B is and this is only her first kid. But only her stomach has gotten big and she’s very happy about that. B’s a little jealous but she’s insane ‘cause of the hormones.


Anyway, Angel, Gunn and Wesley were the last ones to show up. We have a big awning over our back porch so Angel can join in the festivities. It was a nice surprise seeing them. Apparently they’re here with Ken and Queenie tacking some demon thing that’s been killin off a lot of people. And believe me when I say I can’t wait to get in on a piece of that action. The slaying around here isn’t boring, well, not really. It sucks that I have to do it by myself, I like patrolling with B, but there are plenty of demons and vamps around here to keep me busy. I’m so excited about this ‘cause it’s been a long time since I’ve slayed with anyone else.


“Mama, I want that piece,” Addy says and points to a part of the cake where there’s a little flower made out of icing. I carefully cut it and put it on a plate and then give her a scoop of ice cream. So far today is turning out much better then I thought it was going to. Everyone is getting along and enjoying themselves, demons have come in to try and kill us all, no one’s cursed anyone else’s drink so they’ll turn all pre-historic and Addy hasn’t thrown a temper tantrum. Damn, can that kid scream when she really wants to. And we haven’t argued today, I think that’s a good thing too. We usually fight a lot, now that she’s getting older and developing her own little personality. The thing about it is her personality is a lot like mine, so we fight more then we used to.


When the cake is cut and everyone has a piece and some ice cream I take step back and just watch. It’s kinda rare that I do stuff like this. I don’t normally watch a crowd of people, I like to be in it, but this is different. Reminiscing I guess is what I’m doin, ‘cause I’m mostly watching Addy as she helps B scoop out some ice cream. I remember when Addy just turned two. She had this really bad ear infection and ‘cause she’s a slayer the pain medicine didn’t last as long as it should’ve.


I stayed up with her for three nights in a row because her ear hurt so damn bad she couldn’t sleep. I tried talking to her, reading to her, playing a couple quiet games, but nothing calmed her down. So I sang to her. I sang her a song that I used to sing to B, but I haven’t in a really long time. Don’t know why, I just haven’t. But it calmed Addy down and she was able to go to sleep. But I remember her lying against me and I had my arms wrapped around her and she was cryin and screamin and she wouldn’t let me go. And then I started to sing to her and at the end of the song she was quiet, and I sang the song again and she fell asleep. I did that every night for three days. I was tired and bitchy in the morning but I loved the fact that Addy was so clingy because normally she isn’t very affectionate or clingy or anything like that.


I was kinda like that when I was little. I can’t remember anything earlier then five-years-old but I remember I would play with my friends at school and then come home and play in my room and I pretty much ignored my mom and dad. The only time I ever wanted to be physically close with my dad was when I was tired. Every night I would sit in his lap, and we’d be sitting on his big recliner and he’d read me bedtime stories or we’d watch one last T.V. show before he carried me into my bedroom and tucked me in. And I can remember wakin up ‘cause the neighbors were fighting and I’d get a little scared and I’d run into my parents’ bedroom and jump up on the bed and wrap my dad’s arms around me. Both my parents were really heavy sleepers, took way more then me movin around on the bed to wake ‘em up.


Addy’s only done that once. She had a bad dream and woke me up and I was too tired to calm her down then put her back in her bed so I just let her sleep in between me and Buffy. She’s pretty good at the self-comfort thing, she’ll calm herself down after a nightmare and go back to sleep. Or sometimes she’ll just lay in her bed and cry ‘cause she’s really scared. I’ve gone in a couple times and calmed her down but I think Mattie’s gone in more then me. I don’t know how he wakes up ‘cause of her cryin. It’s always really quiet, she never screams or anything, and Mattie is one of the heaviest sleepers ever. But he’ll wake up and go in her room and sit down on the edge of her bed and talk to her and she’ll finally calm down and go back to sleep.


I hear the backdoor open and I turn around and see, my dad? What is he doing here? I thought he went back to Boston? I guess that doesn’t matter, does it? Did Buffy talk to him or something? ‘Cause I just saw them exchange a little smile. This is a set up. I can’t believe she knew my dad was comin back and she didn’t tell me. Nice surprise though, I gotta admit that.


“Grampa Chris!” Addy and Mattie scream at the same time and run up to him. They both love him to death. I knew he’d make a good impression on them. Addy loves him ‘cause he’s always complimenting her. I don’t know how many times he’s called her the prettiest girl in the world. Mattie likes him ‘cause he likes having another guy around. Someone who can teach him about bein a guy, ya know? It took Mattie a couple weeks to warm up to him bu t he finally did. My dad’s always been good with little kids. Has this whole gentle giant thing about him. Even though his voice is kinda...strange soundin at first it doesn’t take long to get used to it. I miss his old voice though.


“Hey, there. How are my favorite grand kids doin?” he asks and they tell them that they’re fine and then he picks Addy up and gives her a little kiss on the cheek. She smiles and giggles ‘cause of the stubble on his face. “So birthday girl, how’s the party goin so far?” She smiles and says it’s going great ‘cause everyone she knows is here. I can’t help but smile. So he’s back, but for how long? He wipes some frosting off the corner of her mouth with his finger and then wipes it off on his jeans. “Have you opened any presents yet?”


“No. Mommy says I have ta wait ‘til we’re done with the cake.” I look over at Kennedy when I see her step forward. She hasn’t met my dad yet and she has this look on her face and I know she’s gonna start some shit. She’s protective, I don’t blame her. Part of it has to do with the slayer side of her, the other part has to do with the fact that my little girl is in the arms of a man who looks a little dangerous, and Kennedy’s never met him so she isn’t gonna trust him until I tell her it’s all good. And even after that she’ll be a little weary. That’s just her bein a good aunt. So before she can say anything I step forward and give my dad a hug.


“Hey, Dad, you didn’t tell me you were comin over.” He hugs me back and gives me a little kiss on the top of my head. I look over at Kennedy and Cordelia and motion them over. They put down their drinks and stand next to me. “Dad, this is my friend Kennedy and her girlfriend Cordelia. Guys, this is my dad Chris.” Kennedy’s suspicious, Cordelia’s a little freaked out ‘cause he’s like eight inches taller then she is. And he has the rough look down pat. He is one very intimidating guy, I think that’s why Kennedy is sizin him up right now.


“It’s very nice meeting you,” Cordelia says and they shake hands. She’s smiling and looks friendly and everything but I can see in her eyes that she’s a little scared of him. I can’t help but feel proud. It takes a lot to get to Queenie this way ‘cause she’s seen a lot of scary demons and shit ‘cause of her job at Angel’s. So I’m proud that my dad is able to freak her out a little. He says a polite ‘nice to meet you too’ and then lets go of her hand. Then he turns his attention back to Addy.


“Your present’s out in my car, wanna help me get it?” he asks and she nods her head yes. Hmm, I wonder what he got her? I guess we’ll find out later. I watch as he carries her around the side of the house. He’s gonna open up the gate instead of goin back through the house. I walk over to B and give her an evil little smile. She gets a worried look on her face and I lean in really close so my lips are almost touching her ear.


“You knew he was comin over, didn’t you?” I ask and she gulps and nods her head yes. I smile a little more and give the shell of her ear a little lick. “You’re so gonna pay for not telling me.” She shivers a little and squeaks out a little ‘ok’ and I can see the look of lust in her eyes. She likes it when I ‘punish her’. It’s nothin really. I just tie her wrists to the bed post and spend hours teasin her before I finally send her over the edge in a mind blowing orgasm. But that’s nothin compared to what I did with a couple of the guys back in Sunnydale. Me and B aren’t into the whole domination/submission thing. We experimented a little with it before she got pregnant with Mattie but we didn’t really like. Every once in a while I liked to be tied down but that’s about it.


Well, it’s been an hour since my dad showed up. All the cake is gone, all but one container of ice cream has been eaten, and all the presents have been opened. Willow got her a bunch of educational toys, Xander got her these really cool blocks that have magnets on the top and bottom so they won’t fall over, Dawn bought her massive amounts of clothes, Giles got her a swan princess Barbie and a few packages of extra clothes for the doll. He also handed me and B a document stating how much money is in the college fund he set up for her. Enough so she can go to any school in the world if she gets accepted. He set one up for Mattie on his last birthday. We did the polite thing of telling him it’s too much and we can’t accept it, but we take it. Once we get ‘financially independent’ we’d never be able to raise enough money to send either one of ‘em to a good college


Anyway, B got her this huge tea set. Has over a hundred pieces to it and I know by the end of the week most of ‘em are gonna be lost. She also got her a dress up play set, with a bunch of costumes and fake make up and all kinds of stuff. I got her somethin that I always wanted when I was a kid: a dollhouse. But not just any dollhouse. I had this one custom made. It has three stories. The downstairs has a living room, a kitchen, a dining room, a conservatory, a foyer, and a study. The second story has a master bedroom two smaller bedrooms, a bathroom, and a balcony. The third story is the attic.


The outside has a large porch. The little plastic windows look like stained glass, the window frames are gray, the shutters are pink, the house itself is a light grayish off white type of color. And I bought furniture for every room in it. And also some other stuff. Like instead of having three bedrooms, she can have two bedrooms and a nursery. Stuff like that. I also bough her a bunch of different dolls for it so she doesn’t have to play with the same ones over and over again. B thinks I’m totally insane but I love it. I’m definitely gonna be playin with this probably more then Addy. All in all today was a great day. My dad’s movin here thanks to Giles for givin him a job and a place to live, my baby got a lot of great stuff and I got to see my best friend again. Yep, right now life is great.