Reditum ad se

Summary: Buffy comes to her senses after a year in Rome.
Rating: NC-17 (mostly for explicit sexual descriptions)
Pairings: Buffy/Xander. Or should I say Xander/Buffy, since it’s really about Xan? There might be some Dawn/Spike implied, not sure how long this one will go.
Feedback: Yes, please. I just started posting my fic, so try to be gentle, please.
Betas: I could use one!
Archive? Ask me first.
Disclaimer: I don’t own them…I’m just borrowing them, since Joss isn’t using them anymore. If I were making money from this, I would have a much better laptop!

Chapter 1

“Buffy! If you don’t hurry up I’m so leaving without you!” Xander Harris snickered at the angry shout from the hallway as he finished adjusting his necktie. His girls were at it again. He hoped Buffy wouldn’t give Dawn too hard a time today. The youngest Summers was understandably excited about finally graduating from high school, and her excitement had been manifesting itself in the form of extreme bossiness for the last few days. Normally, Buffy would have been amused as he was at her sister’s antics, but lately she had been acting kind of strange…unusually quiet, and snappy for no apparent reason.

Hearing the two girls talking in the hall, he took a quick look in the mirror and checked one last time to be sure that his eye patch was in place. When he heard the loud thunking sound of high heels on hardwood flooring moving toward his door, he chuckled. Poor Buffy. He suspected Dawn had taken to wearing heels recently for the sole purpose of driving home the fact that she was an adult now; but Buffy was developing a real complex from having her sister towering over her all the time. Sighing sadly at his reflection and deciding it wasn’t going to improve no matter how long he stared disgustedly at his patch, Xander opened the door and slipped into the hallway…just in time to hear Dawn say, with a scornful snort “Pfft! Right, like I really want to see that again. Ew! No thank you. It’s Xander, it was like walking in on Dad or something!” Ah yes, Buffy was still harping on the ‘naked Xander’ incident the week before, when Dawnie had accidentally walked in on him when he was air drying on his bed after a particularly long, hot shower. Why the hell hadn’t she gotten over that yet? Completely oblivious to her sister, who was looking warningly at her, quite obviously trying to alert the brunette to his presence, Dawn shuddered visibly and turned back toward Xander’s door. She jumped when she found him leaning against the doorframe.

He looked at her pointedly, with one brow raised questioningly, “Gee, you’d better watch it Dawnie…compliments like that might go right to my head!” He laughed off the sting he felt from her remarks.

“I didn’t mean-“ Dawn stammered, “I was just-you’re not that bad, I just don’t-” She got that wide eyed look all the Scoobies got when anyone even remotely touched on the subject of his appearance. Xander really hated that look.

Xander snorted, “Again with the compliments!” He shook his head sadly. “No wonder I can’t get a date to save my life. God, I hope it never comes to that-dating to save my life. I’d be doomed!”

Dawn frowned. Looking sadly at him, she reached for him, only to be cut off at the pass by her perfectly made up older sister, who swept in and hooked her arm his and pulled him away from the doorframe. “Xan, the only reason you can’t get a date is all the girls are afraid to ask you, and you never ask them,” She said, in a tone that would clearly accept no arguments.

Xander automatically reached up and adjusted the black patch covering his missing left eye. “Yeah…they’re afraid, but not of asking me out,” he muttered softly. Pulling away from Buffy, he began walking briskly toward their front door. He knew she meant well, but how could he ask out any other women when he was only interested in the one woman who had absolutely no interest in him. Buffy had made herself perfectly clear, almost immediately after they met, that she would never see him as anything more than a friend. He’d moved on, of course; but with Anya gone, and living with Buffy for just over a year now, he had found all his old feelings sneaking back. Except, the teenage infatuation he had felt in high school, which was mostly based on the fact that Buffy was a gorgeous little blonde with an exciting secret life, was gone. In its place were even stronger feelings, ones based on his years of close friendship with her, and getting to know the real girl that lived under the cold, hard as nails exterior she often hid behind.

Maybe after she and Dawn moved to London he would finally be able to move on; find someone who didn’t mind that he looked like a reject from a bad pirate movie. Someone who didn’t know about the life he had lived on the Hellmouth all those years. Someone who wasn’t a smart, funny, amazing warrioress who would (and had) fight to the death to defend those she cared about. As he pushed open the front door of the their luxurious condominio, his shoulders slumped dejectedly. Who was he kidding? Maybe he should take Giles up on his offer to join the council. There was nothing for him here in Rome without her. Being with her only as her goofy ‘Xander-shaped friend’ was better than not being with her at all.

Just then, Dawn stepped up beside him and whispered, “She feels the same way about you, you know,”

“Huh?” Startled, he turned toward her, “Who? Wha-?”

“Oh, like everyone doesn’t know,” Dawn snickered. Looking around like she thought they were being watched, she leaned over and whispered, “Tonight…when she starts crying…because she feels guilty that she’s relieved she doesn’t have to play mom to me anymore…have her look in the back of the freezer. She’ll be yours forever. And you owe me a hundred bucks,”

Buffy…she was talking about Buffy. Buffy felt the same way about him? Xander stared at her in disbelief; arm still raised to try to hail an approaching cab. Then her other words registered…look in the freezer? Ha! His evil scheme had worked. He’d dropped hints weeks ago that he would like to get Buffy some of her favorite ice cream, too bad it wasn’t available in Rome, blah, blah, blah. He knew Dawn was never one to back down from a challenge, and she had come through. She probably even thought it had been her idea. However, the price seemed a bit steep, “A hundred bucks?!”

Dawn laughed at him, and flipped her long brown hair back over her shoulder. He watched in horror as she hitched up her skirt slightly and then climbed, giggling, into the cab that had screeched to a halt in front of her. Where the hell had his little Dawnie learned that particular trick?

Before he could worry too long about who he was going to have to kill for corrupting his ‘little sister,’ Buffy appeared at his side and grabbed his hand. Looking down at her, he smiled softly at the sight of her tear filled eyes. Leaning over, he kissed the top of her head and murmured, “Are you going to be all right?”

“No,” She admitted with a sniffle. Wiping her cheeks she added, “But I’ve got you here to pick up the pieces, right?” She winked at him and climbed into the car after her sister.
“Always,” Xander sighed and climbed in after his girls.

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Author's note: This story is a companion to 'Two vamps, a girl, and a prophecy.' You don't really have to read them both for them to make sense, but you won't get the whole picture unless you do. ;-) There is a third story in the series coming soon, too, if my muse cooperates.