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“You stealing things now?” Faith asks.
Dawn freezes, one foot on the first step.
“No,” she lies.
“I saw you at the mall,” Faith replies, her eyes still fixed on the television. There’s some old cartoon playing that Dawn thinks looks horrendously boring, but Faith seems to love that stuff.
Dawn looks up the stairs longingly, but slowly steps back. There’s nowhere she can run anyway; Faith practically lives here.
Dawn crosses her arms, posturing confidence, and walks over to where Faith is sitting on the couch.
“What were you doing at the mall?”
Faith frowns, finally turning to Dawn. “I needed clothes,” she says.
“Oh,” Dawn replies dumbly, “right.”
“Us ex-convict types don’t always stick around in orange jumpsuits, ya know?”
“I know.”
Faith snorts, turning back away from Dawn. “Yeah, well, I guess with the road you're on, you should get used to orange. Though, mine were that blue type. More flatterin’ – not that that’s too useful in the slammer–”
“Thought you’d have found it very useful in jail,” Dawn says before she can think better of it. It’s the type of quip she’d make to Willow or Tara; she stills nervously when she realises who the recipient of her big mouth was this time.
Faith just grins, sparing Dawn a rare appraising look. “Well, I can’t say it hurt,” she says easily. The edge that used to be ever-present in conversations with Faith has dissipated since she’s been back. Dawn remembers when she was younger, and Faith would come around the house. She remembers being equal parts nervous and amazed. She was in awe of Faith – and vaguely terrified.
Faith had always been a bit of a bomb. Trip the wrong wire, and an explosion would be imminent. Dawn – and, Dawn supposes, everyone else – had never known which wires to avoid.
Dawn stands, uneasily shifting her weight as she waits for Faith’s verdict. Faith’s eyes have returned to the cartoon, listlessly following around the animated figures as they fight each other. It’s some Looney Tunes-type thing that Dawn hasn’t found entertaining since she was five, but Faith seems amused, in a silent, non-expressive sort of way.
Dawn prefers it that way – she thinks the entire house might fall down if Faith actually honest-to-god laughed. The most they ever get out of her are snorts and dry laughter; Buffy used to be able to make her laugh, back then. But nowadays the two avoid each other in some sort of silent understanding that Dawn, frankly, doesn’t understand one bit.
She knows they patrol together, walking around in circles without exchanging one word. They come home, clean up, and eat dinner all in the same silence. Dawn would find it stranger, if Buffy was still her Buffy.
Scratch that – it’s still her Buffy. She’s just not the same. Dawn knows she’ll never be the same again. Dying isn’t exactly someone just ups and walks away from with no trauma. Even the first time Buffy died, she’d still gone a little…
She’d been different. Then she’d reverted back.
After the first month Buffy had been alive again, Dawn kept waiting for the switch back. Over the past few weeks, Dawn realised that it wasn’t going to happen. The old Buffy wasn’t going to come back to them. She had died – for real.
Dawn still waits by the couch, watching Faith for some clue as to where this conversation is going to go – but it doesn’t. Faith continues to ignore her. It’s annoying really.
Dawn’s experienced a lot of pseudo-parenting styles over the past few months. Buffy, Giles, Tara, Willow, Xander. It’d had been an adjustment, but one that Dawn understood. Faith, on the other hand, Dawn has no barometer for.
Faith just turned up after Buffy died (sent by Giles to guard the hellmouth) and silently worked her way through the cemeteries. Dawn had appreciated the distance at the beginning, still bitter about the last time she’d seen Faith. But now it was just plain weird. Dawn figured it would stop once Buffy was back alive, but if anything, Faith was even more unresponsive now. She always seemed to be trying to blend into the background, as if hoping no one could see her in the house.
“So?” Dawn puts her hands on her hips, jutting out her chin.
“So what, kid?” Faith startles a little when she turns to see Dawn still standing there, as if she’d forgotten about Dawn’s presence.
“Aren’t you going to give me a speech or something? Tell me how wrong it was.”
“Uh – no? Wasn’t planning on it.”
“Wh-why?”
“Way I figure, I’m not really the sort to be giving speeches on being good.”
“But – you’re supposed to tell me off. That’s what happens next.” Dawn frowns in genuine confusion. As weird as it’s been adjusting to everyone’s parenting styles, she still understands the basics. Dawn gets caught doing something she shouldn’t be, and she gets reprimanded. It’s a simple equation. Way simpler than the algebra homework she’s avoiding doing right now.
“Huh?” Faith mutes the television. The volume was on the lowest it could be anyway. Dawn could barely hear it; it was just a slight murmur in the background. Now it’s gone, she misses it. It felt like a buffer, retracting some level of severity from her current predicament.
“Stealing is wrong.”
“Yeah.”
“I stole – I did something wrong.”
“Kid, you know I got convicted on murder two, right? I don’t really give a fuc– a shit about you stealing a sweater or somethin’.”
“You know ‘shit’ is also a swear word, right?” Dawn asks.
Faith shrugs. “Then don’t say it – and don’t go snitchin’ to the others ‘bout my bad language.”
“I’m pretty sure if they think you’re a bad influence, it’s not because of the swearing,” Dawn replies.
Faith snorts, “I reckon you’re right on that one.” She looks down, picking at the frayed ends of her top.
“They don’t actually think you’re a bad influence… I think,” Dawn says, eyes tracking Faith’s fingers as they knead into the tearing fabric.
“Nah, they do,” Faith says. “They just need me.”
“Not really,” Dawn replies before she thinks better of it. Faith’s eyes snap to her with an intense alertness. “I mean… Buffy’s back.”
“Sorta,” Faith murmurs.
“Buffy’s sorta back,” Dawn amends. “She can slay.”
“Yeah,” Faith mutters. “That she can do.”
For the first time, Dawn wonders if Faith’s as disappointed as she is that Buffy’s not been acting like herself. Dawn knows it’s not as simple as Faith not caring at all about Buffy – things between the two of them can never be defined as simple. But before, she’d figured that maybe it’s easier for Faith this way. With Buffy like this, there’s less tension, less opportunity for fights.
Buffy’s not making snide comments about Faith’s trip down evil lane – she’s not making comments at all.
Dawn wonders if Faith misses being able to get Buffy riled up the same way that Dawn misses how she used to be able to make Buffy laugh. Hell, maybe Faith misses making Buffy laugh too – but that was something she lost long before Buffy died.
“You’re supposed to look after us,” Dawn says suddenly, a wave of compassion for Faith flooding over her as she considers that Faith probably does miss Buffy – in some weird way that Dawn would never be able to understand. Dawn had always considered Faith has adjacent from the mourning the rest of them had gone through. Now she wonders if they’ve been in the same boat all along, and Dawn’s just been too focussed on everyone else to realise that Faith misses Buffy too. “That’s why you’re here. Because we need you.”
“What ‘we’? ‘Cause, the way I figure, no one here needs me. Not anymore. It’s just a matter of time ‘fore Willow or Giles – or, more likely, Buffy – comes to their senses and sends me back to jail. Or, hell, maybe they skip that step and just call the cops one day.”
“They wouldn’t do that.”
“Sure,” Faith says sceptically.
“We need you.” Dawn settles on the couch arm, nervously edging her way onto it. “She needs you. I need you.”
“She doesn’t need me – and you don’t either. You got enough wannabe guardians lookin’ out for ya.”
“Yeah,” Dawn says, because she does. She has enough people playing parent. They’re doing a good enough job at it – as good a job as anyone could do given the circumstances. None of them are actually enough though, not really. None of them are her mom, and that’s the only person Dawn really wants to be looking after her right now – or ever. “But I need you to look after her. And she needs that too – even if she doesn’t realise it.”
“She doesn’t need it–”
“Yes, she does.”
“No.” Faith shakes her head. “She doesn’t. She’s still as strong as ever – hell, maybe she’s stronger. I reckon she’d still beat me in a fight.” Faith’s eyes dart around. “Though, don’t tell her I said that, alright?”
“It’s not about being strong enough. It’s about…” Dawn pauses, letting the thought press at her. She tries to suppress it most of the time, chalking it up to paranoia. But sometimes she can’t help it. She looks at Buffy and wonders if she even wants to be alive; sometimes she thinks Buffy would have preferred it if they left her where she was – wherever that was.
“It’s about what?” Faith prompts impatiently.
“Wanting to be alive,” Dawn eventually says, her words barely audible. Dawn thinks that if Faith wasn’t a slayer, she’d be forced to repeat herself, but instead Dawn watches as the words settle with Faith.
Faith sits forward, her shoulders tensing. Her eyes are fixed on the scene, watching the mute cartoon as the scenes change. “You think she doesn’t wanna be alive?” Faith eventually says, her voice almost as quiet as Dawn’s had been. It holds the same concern that Dawn’s had. Whatever past history lay between the two slayers, Faith doesn’t want Buffy dead. Faith cares about her.
“Sometimes,” Dawn admits. “Do… do you?”
Faith looks down at her hands. She rolls her shoulders back. “Sometimes.”
“Does she talk to you?” Dawn blurts out.
“What?”
“It’s just – she doesn’t talk to me. Not anymore. Not like before. And I know she doesn’t talk to Willow or Xander.” Dawn stands up and starts pacing around the living room. “Or anyone, really. Maybe Giles, a little bit. But not about her feelings or anything. Not about being dead–”
“Why would you think she would talk to me?” Faith rolls her eyes as if the idea is preposterous. “I’m the last person she’d talk to about importance shit. We both know that.”
Dawn shakes her head. “Sometimes I think you’re the only person she’d talk to about that stuff.”
“You’re off your rocker then. Buffy doesn’t trust me. Never has, never will – can’t blame her for it either.”
“You get under her skin.”
“And she gets under mine,” Faith says, hand lifting her t-shirt slightly. Dawn catches the briefest glimpse of a scar before Faith pulls her top back down.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Whatever.”
“She might not say it in a mushy, feel-y way like she would with us, but she would talk to you. She always used to. She just disguises it better, and you’re too–” Dawn catches herself in a time for once, an insult dying on her tongue. Faith raises an eyebrow, and leans back. She almost looks disappointed – as if she’d have preferred it if Dawn had said something mean. “Does she say anything?”
“I already told you–”
“Not a single word? You two are out there for hours. You can’t just be walking around in silence, shoulder-to-shoulder without a single word. You must talk about something!” Dawn’s not sure if she feels more desperate or exasperated. Faith can’t seem to get it through her thick head that Buffy doesn’t hate her; and Dawn can’t stop reaching for the smallest scraps of hope that Buffy might one day be okay again.
“I mean,” Faith shrugs, “small talk, sure. Weather, slaying, house bills and stuff. Adult shit is expensive.”
“Is that why you got a job?”
Faith just shrugs again. “We don’t talk about nothing important, kid.”
Dawn pauses, “That’s a double negative.”
“A what now?”
Dawn shakes her head. “Nothing.”
“What’s with the interrogation, anyway?” Faith asks. “Isn’t it your bedtime or something?”
“It’s barely 8 o’clock.”
Faith pauses, and shrugs. “Homework time?”
“I was going to do my homework before you called me over to tell me off!” Dawn exclaims defensively.
“Woah, woah. Tell you off?” Faith puts her hands up. “When did I tell you off?”
“You said you knew I stole stuff–”
“But I didn’t tell you off – if anything, you told yourself off!”
“Well, you were supposed to tell me off!”
“I’m not here to look after you – I’m not one of your guardians like Willow and Tara–”
“You kind of are though!” Dawn interrupts, her exclamation getting away from her. She regrets it immediately, as Faith takes shifts uncomfortably on the couch, an odd look on her face that makes Dawn squirm.
“I’m a felon.”
“So?”
Faith practically does double-takes. “S-so?!” she exclaims, incredulous. “That’s not not a big deal.”
Dawn shrugs. “Not a big deal to me.”
“I murdered two people – and that’s just what I got convicted for. Do you not remember that I tried to kill Angel? And Willow? And Xander? – and I kidnapped you and your mom–”
“Yeah. That was so not cool”
Faith’s frown deepens almost comically. “That is not an appropriate reaction to kidnapping and murder.”
“God, prison really made you lame didn’t it.”
“I am not lame.”
“Well…” Dawn’s eyes dart towards the screen and the cartoon that’s silently playing in the background. It’s a Friday night, and Faith’s been sitting in the living room for the last two hours watching cartoons whilst she waits for Buffy to come home so they can patrol together. That’s Dawn’s definition of lame.
“You’re supposed to be scared of me,” Faith says. She looks oddly sad about the fact that Dawn isn’t scared of her. It reminds Dawn a little bit of Spike, and his over-insistence in being deemed scary. Dawn thinks it comes from a different place though – when it comes down to it, Spike’s still a vampire with no soul. Faith, on the other hand, seems more annoyed whenever people act like she didn’t commit the crimes she did – like she’s sad they don’t still resent her more for her past actions.
“What can I say,” Dawn replies, “you’re just not very intimidating.”
“That’s so not true–”
“You couldn’t even tell me off about stealing,” Dawn says.
“You are such a weird kid. Why do you want to be told off!”
“I don’t want to be told off–”
“Coulda fooled me.”
“–I just think it’s weird that you brought it up and then weren’t going to follow up on it at all,” Dawn continues, ignoring Faith’s interruption.
“God, sometimes you are so like Buffy, what with your over-insistence on this morality bullshit.”
“Well,” Dawn says, that familiar feeling of desolation rising back within her as she thinks on it, “she’s not really like that anymore, is she?” Dawn says. Buffy doesn’t have the energy to climb the hill and gain a moral high ground anymore. Most days, she doesn’t have the energy – or will – to do anything beyond the bare minimum.
It’s not that Dawn doesn’t appreciate Buffy doing the bare minimum. She does – she really does. It’s just – she misses her sister.
She thought that her being back from the dead was going to fix everything. Everything could just go back to how it should be – or as close to ‘how it should be’ they can get, when Joyce is still buried six feet under. Instead they’re still operating in some weird limbo where all Dawn feels like she can do is wait until her sister is back alive again.
“I just – I don’t think she’s alright,” Dawn starts to ramble. It’s not the kind of conversation she’d usually have with Faith – or anyone, for that matter. Maybe Willow, or Tara. But for the most part she keeps her worries to herself, and pushes them aside. No one has time for her childish issues. There’s bigger stuff to deal with, and the last thing Dawn wants to do is be the annoying teenager getting in the way again (though, sometimes that seems to happened despite her best efforts). “Everything’s just so off at the moment. She’s so off. It’s like she’s barely here, and I’m just scared she’s never going to be–”
“C’mon, kid,” Faith interrupts with unrestrained frustration, “you pulled her out of heaven. What did you expect would happen?”
Dawn gasps, her chest tightening. For a moment she feels like she’s under ice, struggling to breathe. “You think she was in heaven?” Dawn manages to say, words so heavy they taste like lead.
Faith frowns. “It’s Buffy – the Buffy Summers. Patron saint of ‘do good’ and all that bull. Where else would she have been,” Faith adds.
“She was in – we thought – she,” Dawn stammers, then shakes her head resolutely. “She was in a hell dimension.”
Faith pauses, sitting forward in her seat. For a moment she looks like she’s considering Dawn’s words, then she says, “No.”
“No?”
“No.”
“How would know? You weren’t here.” Dawn crosses her arms.
“I’d have felt it.”
“Felt it?” Dawn scoffs.
“She wasn’t suffering, she was just dead,” Faith says, her words bitter and angry in a way Dawn has never heard them. She says ‘dead’ with such an unforgiving finality that, for a moment, Dawn forgets Buffy came back.
A key twists in the front door, and it creaks open. Buffy walks in, and stands across from Dawn and Faith with an unspoken curiosity. Dawn smiles at her in greeting, and Buffy returns the smile (Dawn knows it’s forced; she pretends it isn’t). Buffy turns to Faith, her eyes hardening slightly, before she forcefully exhales the tension out of her body.
Faith stands up. “Time for patrol?” Faith asks. Buffy nods.
Dawn watches as the two get ready in silence. Her eyes track Buffy, and her almost robotic movements. She looks the same as she has the past few months. She isn’t living, she’s just going through the motions, getting through the day.
Buffy filters through the weapons trunk, pausing to hand Faith a knife. The two make eye contact as Faith reaches to take the knife from her. For a second Buffy’s emotionless mask flickers. Then it fades, and Buffy returns to the trunk, pulling out a crossbow.
Dawn lets her eyes flick to Faith, who’s watching Buffy’s motions with a contemplative look in her eye. She nudges Buffy to the side and pulls out a stake. Buffy doesn’t so much as flinch as Faith takes up her space.
Dawn wonders if she’ll ever be able to figure out the secret language the two of them communicate in – the language of non-communication. The two work in tandem: two slayers; one birth right.
Dawn thinks she knows her sister better than anyone. They grew up together (false memories or not; Dawn decides they count regardless). They’re sisters, bonded in blood and trauma, and petty fights over which slice of cake was bigger (they were identical). Yet, sometimes, when Dawn looks at Buffy and Faith interact, she wonders if she’s wrong.
She thinks, in some sort of unresolved conclusion to her theory, she’s not wrong. She knows Buffy better than anyone else does; but Faith knows Buffy differently to anyone else does. And maybe that’s just as significant.
The two head out the door, Faith barely a step behind Buffy. Then, suddenly, Faith pauses in the doorway. She waits, letting Buffy go ahead, and then turns to Dawn, “Look, return the shit you stole, and I won’t say anything. Deal?”
Dawn frowns for a moment, then nods. “Yeah. Fine. Deal.”