Date Night (4 page)

“How so?” Buffy asked suspiciously.

“Just work with me on this one,” the dark-haired girl started, “but let's just say you've been dancing all night…gettin' hot and heavy. Well what if in the middle of your dancing, some chick starts dancing up on ya. Would you be okay with that?”

Buffy considered the odd question. “Sure, I guess. I mean, I've danced with Willow and some of the other girls before. As long as she isn't molesting me,” she lightly laughed, “I'm fine with that.”

“What if she wanted to do shots with ya?” the Boston girl continued.

“Is she buying?”

Faith laughed. “Yeah. Sure,” the Boston woman agreed. “She's got an open tab.”

“Free alcohol,” Buffy smiled. “I'm in.”

“What if she wanted to do
body
shots?” the younger slayer countered. Her voice dropped slightly in a conspiratorial tone. “You know…suck her drink outta your belly button, and lick salt off your neck, and stuff like that?”

Faith's unexpected words made the blonde falter. Plus the sound of her raspy voice was downright criminal sometimes. She could make a Dr. Seuss book sound sexual with little effort. “I…yeah…whatever, I could handle it,” Buffy said with minimal confidence.

“What if that girl was me?” the Boston girl pressed dangerously.

A sudden image of Faith grabbing onto her hips and slowly dragging her tongue along her neck flashed in Buffy's brain. “I-I'm,” she stuttered, “I'd still be fine.”

“Whatever, Blondie,” Faith laughed lightly. “I bet you'd be all worked up.”

Buffy scoffed. “Whatever,” she stated stubbornly. “I could handle whatever you throw at me.”

Faith made a clucking noise. “Sounds like a challenge. And you know how I love those.”

“You might think you know me, Faith,” Buffy shot back defiantly, “but I'm not the same girl you knew in Sunnydale.”

"Oh yeah?” the Boston girl replied. “So how'd ya feel if we moved the drinking game down lower?” she questioned. “Still think you could handle that, B?"

Buffy felt surprisingly warm and kicked the blanket off her legs. “Lower?” she squeaked. “Like the basement?”

Faith's voice dropped slightly. “Don't play dumb, Princess. You know
exactly
what I mean.” Her voice became impossibly husky. “I bet you wanna know what my tongue feels like.”

The blonde couldn't form intelligible words. “Guh.”

There was a slight rustling noise over the phone line as if Faith was moving around and the phone was getting jostled. “Sorry if I crossed a line, B. All this chattin' got me a little worked up,” she admitted, her voice still dripping with pheromones. “Plus your song choice was wicked sexy.”

Buffy cleared her throat. “Ah, uhm, what are you doing right now?” she asked when she continued to hear unidentified noises in the background.

“I don't think you really want to know,” Faith said, her voice slightly pained.

“S-sure I do,” the elder slayer pressed on.

The Boston girl hesitated. “Well, I, ah, I popped the top button of my jeans open and slipped my hand down the front of my pants,” she revealed. “Not really doin' anything down there though…not…not yet at least.”

Buffy swallowed hard. It now felt
impossibly
warm in her house. Maybe the thermostat was broken.

“Maybe…maybe you should join me,” the brunette girl proposed nervously. “We could, ah, help each other out.”

Buffy opened her mouth, but hesitated in her reply when she heard clicking noises over the telephone line. She pulled the cordless away from her ear and grimaced when she recognized the number on her caller ID. Preston was calling on the other line.

She contemplated letting his call go to voicemail - he'd been the ass, not her after all - but she decided against it. He was no doubt calling to apologize, and if there was one thing Buffy loved, it was groveling.

“I-I have to go, Faith,” Buffy said in a breathless tone.

“Why?” the dark-haired girl countered.

“I just…I just do,” the elder slayer replied helplessly.

Faith gave a disgruntled noise. “Okay,” she conceded. “Talk to you soon though?” Her voice lilted hopefully at the end of her question.

Buffy felt the corners of her mouth curl up. “Count on it.”

"Another city, another Big Bad." Faith slung the oversized battleaxe over her shoulder and grinned.

Buffy wiped her hands on her jeans and blew the hair out of her face that had escaped her ponytail. “When will these demons and monsters learn they'll never win?” she quipped.

“You gotta hand it to Evil, though,” the Boston girl chuckled as she swaggered down the deserted road. “It's persistent.”

Buffy wrinkled her nose as she tried to keep up with the taller girl's longer gait. “And always ruins my clothes.”

The dark-haired slayer stopped walking and laughed. “Aw, c'mon Twinkie. It's not that bad.” She reached out and rubbed away a small smudge of dirt from the blonde's cheek. Her fingers lingered on the blonde's skin for just a second longer than they needed to, and Buffy felt an odd stirring in the pit of her stomach.

The Coven had received word that a new evil was spawning near the Cleveland Hellmouth in the city of Cincinnati. The metropolitan area was close enough that energy could be drawn from the Midwestern hell-portal, much as Los Angeles had fed off of Sunnydale, but the area was far enough from Slayer-central to give a false sense of security to those demons that looked to stir up trouble in Ohio.

When Giles had issued Buffy with the request to personally take care of the Cincinnati evil, he'd also insisted that Faith's services be called upon as well. The East Coast had been relatively quiet, and he knew the Boston girl's help would be an asset. Needless to say, Evil didn't stand a chance against the Original Two.

C'mon, B,” Faith urged, pushing her chaotic waves away from her face. “Let's drop off our stuff back at the rooms, and have a little fun. I hear there's a joint around here that makes a wicked sangria. It's the best of both worlds,” she reasoned. “I can get a beer and you can have your girlie drink.”

Since the Council had no connections in the city, the two slayers were staying at a hotel near the airport.

“I don't…” Buffy started, still surprised by Faith's unexpected touch.

“Don't what?” the Boston native interrupted with an easy grin. “Don't tell me you're not
starving
after that slay.” Faith rubbed her hands together. “I'm seriously ready to devour a tableful of tapas.”

Buffy swallowed. Her stomach
was
about ready to eat itself, she had to admit. The blonde slayer was hungry…and other things. All she really wanted to do was go back to her hotel room and take a cold shower, however. She cleared her throat, realizing Faith was staring expectantly at her, waiting on her response.

Finally, despite her better judgment, Buffy nodded.

“Alright,” she conceded. “Let's go.”

+++++++++++++++++

“So it's Friday night,” Faith said after swallowing a mouthful of Spanish food.

Buffy looked up from her goblet drink. “And your point is?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

Faith shrugged and leaned back in her chair. “Just sayin',” she noted, “you're missing out on Date Night.”

The Californian made a face at the other girl's words. “Don't remind me,” she groaned. “I had a hard enough time slipping away for this trip without it being a Friday. Why does Evil always ruin my weekend plans?”

The golden-haired slayer reached for her glass and drank in a rush, relishing the slight burning at the back of her throat. Upon setting her cup back down, Buffy glanced at the half-filled pitcher of sangria left of the table. She knew she shouldn't drink too much - experience told her that her tolerance for alcohol wasn't that high - but she hadn't had a night out like this in a while. Plus, the sangria was awfully tasty.

“Are you drunk yet?” Faith asked, her eyes filled with amusement.

Buffy snapped her gaze back across the table where her eyes settled on the beautiful face of her slaying partner. “No!” she admonished. “And I'm not planning on getting drunk tonight, either.”

Faith snorted. “You and your plans. “ Her hands opened on the table. “Getting drunk's not exactly the kinda thing you
plan,
B. It just kinda happens.”

“Well, speaking of plans,” Buffy noted, choosing to ignore the younger girl, “have you made any plans for Christmas yet?”

Faith's eyes shifted in her head. “I, uh.”

The blonde leaned into the table. “Because the offer still stands, you know. You could come visit in Cleveland.”

The Boston girl ran her fingers through her loose hair. “I'll let you know,” she grunted. “I may have somethin' else to do then.”

“What do you have against Christmas?” Buffy lightly questioned.

Faith leaned back in her chair, precariously balancing on the back two legs. “Nothing,” she stated flatly. “I mean, unless you count how my mom was a junkie and sold the Christmas presents we'd get from Social Services for her next fix.”

The Chosen One frowned deeply. “I'm sorry, Fai,” she apologized. “I guess I wasn't thinking. I somehow always forget that you don't automatically associate holiday-type stuff with happy memories.”

The Boston girl responded with a patented shrug and returned her chair legs to the ground. “Don't worry about it, cutie,” she breezed. “It's not your fault you were blessed with a kick ass family.”

Buffy resisted the urge to point out that her life hadn't exactly been a walk in the park. But this wasn't supposed to be a `whose childhood sucked more' contest, she reminded herself. It just felt so natural, however, to always be in an unstated competition with the younger slayer. Her parents had had an ugly divorce, after all. And her memories of her childhood with Dawn might have been implanted by monks, but they weren't all positive, either. Plus, her mom…

The blonde blinked hard. She didn't - couldn't - think about that, even now, without feeling like the ground beneath her had been suddenly ripped away. She doubted she'd ever truly get used to the idea that her mom had been taken away too soon.

Faith looked down at her own awkward hands. She silently cursed. Why couldn't anything between she and Buffy be easy? The blonde girl had simply asked her to spend the winter holiday with her, and she'd twisted the innocent invitation into a bitter reminder of just how different their pasts had been.

“So, uh,” Faith started, acutely aware of how much fruity wine her sister-Slayer was pouring down her throat. “Isn't this supposed to be like, one of your happy places?”

Buffy raised an eyebrow questioningly.

The Boston woman cleared her throat. “You know,” she tried to clarify, “with the music and dancing? Don't tell me you forgot about that phone call already?”

Buffy's delicate features scrunched together momentarily as she tried to recall what Faith was referring to. After a short silence, her face suddenly registered her recognition.

“O-oh,” she exclaimed, nearly spitting out a mouthful of sangria. “
That
happy place.” She averted her eyes. “I, uh, yeah, I remember that phone call.”

Feeling brave, Faith leaned in closer to the seated slayer. “Too bad you had to run off. We could have had a good time,” her voice dropped low, “just the two of us.”

“I-I-I,” Buffy could no longer form a complete sentence as she lost herself in Faith's smoldering gaze. She squeezed her thighs together, under the cover of their table for two. The Boston girl's telephone taunt echoed in her ears. “
I bet you want to know what my tongue feels like.
”

Faith laughed easily and leaned back again, breaking the spell Buffy had been under. “You never did tell me what was so important that you had to run off.”

Buffy sipped at her drink calmly, but she could hear her heart pounding inside her head. “I don't remember,” she lied.

Faith's glance shifted, grazing over Buffy's head, and she scanned the restaurant. With the late hour, she and Buffy were two of the only people still seated in the dining area. Everyone else had moved on to the dance floor section of the Latin American-inspired business.

The Boston girl stood up from the table and held out her hand to the blonde. “How about we take this party someplace else?” she asked with a dimpled grin.

Buffy seemed to sink further into her chair. “Uh, wh-where exactly are we going?”

Faith nodded her head in the direction of the other dancing couples. “The dance floor, Princess.” She smirked. “What did you think I meant?”

+++++++++++++++++++++

Suggested Listening: Rihanna - “Te Amo”

The music was loud, but not so loud that Buffy couldn't hear the scattered conversations from dancing couples that surrounded she and Faith on the dance floor. The two slayers danced separately, enjoying each other's company, but also danced with other men that approached the duo. At one point Buffy found herself getting twirled around on the dance floor by Faith to some Spanish-guitar inspired song. The blonde laughed as the Boston woman twisted her effortlessly. She couldn't remember the last time she had had this much fun.

When the dance beats slowed down for a less up-tempo song, Buffy was surprised when Faith grabbed one of her arms and spun her close. Breathless, and sweaty from dancing, the blonde did little to completely pull away from the assertive Boston slayer. But having some sense of modesty, she tried to put a little space between their pelvic bones at least.

“Relax, B,” Faith breathed into Buffy's ear when she felt the other slayer start to pull away. She subtly tightened her hold on the smaller girl, grasping the blonde's wrist harder. Buffy could feel the hand in the small of her back become more rigid as well. “No one knows us here,” Faith reasoned in a low tone. “No one's gonna care about two chicks dancing together.”

Reassured by the confident tone in the Boston woman's voice and loosened by the sangria flooding her bloodstream, Buffy relaxed. The two slayers moved as one in time to the slow, sultry beats. It had always been like this with them. What was a natural symbiosis fighting Evil, translated on the dance floor as well. Although the women were very different in their fighting and dancing styles, their unique techniques played off of each other.