Realization.
The music was pulsating and there were bodies on the dance floor, alive and moving to the tunes that flowed from the band onstage that night. Strobe lights in a rainbow of colors bounced off the walls and the faces of the happy people below, giving them an unreal look as if moving in slow motion and she was going full speed. Girls that looked barely 18 strutted around in too short skirts and tops that looked painted on, flipping their hair and flashing flirtatious smiles at any man willing to look. She remembered back at Hemery, and how she was just like those girls, shopping, boys and parties being the main reason for getting up in the morning and what was on her and her friends mine all day long. Her friends were different then too, not at all the family she had adopted over the past 8 years. The girls she had known would have stabbed anyone in the back, for say, a chance to be squad leader on the high school cheerleading team or the must have shirt at the mall when there was only one left in stock. Willow, Xander and Giles have always been a part of her, their presence in every battle, every apocalypse, every waking day. That’s how she won and saved the world so many times…because she had her friends and her family to live for.
Angel, her Mom, Tara and Anya left her and will always have a permanent spot in her heart for them. Buffy couldn’t help but feel guilty when ever Anya’s or Tara’s name would be mentioned and she would see that lost, numb look in Xander or Willow’s eyes because if they would have never met her, she wouldn’t have them in her battles and they wouldn’t have to suffer as much pain as they do now, each time they remember. If she wasn’t the Slayer, maybe her mom would have lived. She could have been there that day and rushed her to a hospital and she would still be here to comfort her tell her everything is going to be alright like she did when Buffy was so young. As much as she was in denial about it for such a long period of time, she knew there was no hope of future with Angel and never would have. He loved her, she loved him but life was unfair to her and the cards she played were that to let him go forever.
Walking down the curving metal staircase, Willow and Kennedy waved her onto the dance floor and she politely denied, holding her glass up in reference to the quest of getting more much needed alcohol. As she came close to the oddly shaped and very modern looking bar, which was covered in neon lights and see through everything, the younger bartender smiled at her. She smiled back hoping he was just being friendly to everyone and not wanting to dive into a deep conversation, Italian wasn’t her thing yet, and she prayed he spoke English. Quickly an arm was around her waist and she heard Xander’s voice in her ear over the loud techno music.
“ Tell me what your getting, Willow and Kennedy are going to get ravenous if you don’t go out and dance with them ! I need to take a break anyways….”, he kissed her on the head and got her request, soon after pushing her in the way of her friends, who were waiting with open arms for her to enter the circle of dancing.
“ C’mon Buffy, relax, let loose ! It all ended months ago ! Were young, living in Italy, and in love !”, with this she smiled at Kennedy and kissed her softly on the lips, both their bodies still in time with the music. Buffy blushed and pretended to occupy her gaze with something on the floor. Willow smiled at Buffy sympathetically.
“ I hate seeing you like this, you get these bouts of depression over all the dumb things that happened in Sunnydale. Sweetheart, it’s over ! Just have fun….”.
Buffy smiled, her sadness hidden away for the night , once more to make her friends happy. She began to dance, loose and wild like she did when she was younger and had no worries about the world. This night she had so many, so many in a strange new place and nowhere to call home. Buffy refused to put a damper on her friends moods by unleashing her problems, and instead took pleasure in seeing there happiness and continued to dance there along side them , long, wild blonde hair spinning about her face as she moved with the high pitched Italian techno. Laughing, her mind at ease for the moment, she stepped off the strobe-tiled floor and found her way to Xander, who was sipping some foreign beer , her brightly colored drink flute awaiting her as she slid into the circular booth next to him.
“ It’s not the Bronze, that’s for sure.” She sipped her drink and set it back down, most of the ice had melted and it was more water than liquid now, but smiled at him in approval anyways.
“ It could be, you know, if it were hundreds of feet down into a crater that used to be our home town of Sunnyhell.”
She smiled
“ How true”.
Xander dismissed himself to the restroom and Buffy looked around at the people and scenery of this Italian nightclub they would have to accept as their new Bronze, having almost spent 3 nights a week in there for about a 6 weeks. She began to envy the girls with the too short skirts on, they were having fun and not lying about it, dancing seductively with the boys, no one around seeming to care. It was a different way of life here and she didn’t know how she was going to cope. The fact that she had been here for half a year and had not been truly happy for at least one day, pissed her off in the greatest sense. Sipping on her drink until his arrival, she got up and worked her way up the curving , glowing neon steps and up to the balcony.
Buffy made her way down the hallway, running her hands along the balcony railing, seeing the happy people below. The wall opposite her plastered in rock band photo’s and different models, amateur picture’s that people wanted publicity for and couldn’t afford professionally, and yet were tackily put up in mass. Her heels clicked on the fiberglass and granite floor, her surrounding’s unfamiliar too her. Turning the corner, she felt eyes on her and she peered down, not in the mood for conversation. As the darkened figure approached , she tripped slightly , dropping her purse. As she kneeled down for it, the figure brushed past her, and the smell of cigarettes, bourbon and finely worm leather filled her nostrils. Buffy’s heart skipped a beat.
She felt a hand sweep against her hair.
The now standing slayer’s gaze was solidly focused on the leather duster that flapped as he walked and she almost cried as she saw platinum blonde hair.
Then, the stranger spoke.
“ Careful there, love.”
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