Title: Let that be a Lesson to you…part 9/11
Author: Sweetdoggie
Disclaimer: No permission has been granted to use the characters. They are owned by their creator, Joss Whedon, Twentieth Century Fox, UPN, WB, and Mutant Enemy. This story is non-profit and is intended solely as entertainment. No copyright infringement is intended.
Giles, she reflected, was excellent with the kids. He helped uncomplainingly with the chores, had learned to change dirty diapers with only a few gasps of total disgust, and interacted really well with the older kids. If he hadn’t been a Field Watcher, a job that pretty much precluded having a family, he would have been a model father.
She returned downstairs to find the household in total chaos. Xander had, for some reason known only to him, removed every stitch of clothing except his shoes and had then stood in the freshly used potty seat. When Giles had tried to grab him, he had leaped out and tracked the contents all over the carpet giggling and shrieking like a laughing hyena. Anya was shrieking in disgust and Tara had managed to hit her sore hand on the edge of the coffee table and was crying and rocking herself back and forth. Willow, apparently tired of being excluded from the fun, was crying herself red in the face. While she was sorely tempted to simply go quietly back upstairs before they saw her, she valiantly decided to help her Watcher.
She stood in the doorway and crossed her arms. In a deadly calm voice she asked them what exactly was going on. Xander skidded to a complete halt, Anya stopped shrieking, Tara came over and showed her the sore hand and baby Willow allowed her cries to taper off into whimpers. Nobody messed with a Slayer when she used that tone of voice.
Buffy picked Tara up and hugged her. Looking at the sore hand, she kissed it and promised to give her something to make it feel better in a minute. She sat her down on the couch. “Anya, sit next to your sister.”
The little girl obeyed without a whimper.
Buffy turned her attention to Xander. She looked at him sternly. “Why don’t you have any clothes on?”
“Hot!” he chortled.
“Why did you make a mess on mommy’s rug?”
He shrugged at that. It had seemed like a good idea at the time.
“You’ve been very naughty, Xander. Say you’re sorry to daddy.”
The tiny boy looked rebellious for all of two seconds then crumpled. “Sowwy, Daddy.”
Giles looked frazzled. He walked to the boy and picked him up gingerly. He stripped the shoes and socks off him and told Buffy he was giving him a bath and putting him to bed. “It won’t hurt him to go this early.”
Buffy nodded. “I’ll change the baby, you can clean up the potty seat mess when you get back. We’ll get the carpet steamer out.”
She quickly changed the whimpering Willow and rocked her for a few minutes till she dropped off to sleep. Buffy put her back down and took the girls to the kitchen. She gave Tara another Tylenol and made them sit quietly while she got the roast and vegetables out of the oven.
Tara wasn’t very hungry and picked at her food. Anya ate some meat and a piece of potato, but turned her face away when Buffy tried to get her to eat a carrot. She didn’t even offer the child one of the onions. After supper, she helped Giles clean up the mess Xander had made.
The girls were bathed and put to bed and Buffy got ready for patrol. “I’m going to the docks tonight.”
“Be careful, Buffy.”
“It’s my middle name.” She kissed him goodbye and left. Since she didn’t have to be up early, she patrolled till midnight. It was slow and she only got two kills in before heading home.
Giles was researching, making notes and paging through various texts scattered on the couch. He looked up as she came in.
“How was it?”
“Slow. Got two of ‘em trying to eat a pan-handler.”
He shuddered. “As if a life on the streets is not difficult enough, we in Sunnydale compound it by having the added threat of the undead.”
“Yeah. I gave him a couple of bucks and told him to get inside. He was pretty scared so he might actually listen. How are things going here?”
“Still no reference to anything to reverse the effects, I’m afraid.”
“Well, pass me a book and I’ll give you a hand.”
She snuggled up next to him on the couch and they read quietly for an hour before she noticed herself nodding off. “I’m going to go to bed, Giles. Are you coming?”
“I think I’ll stay up for just a bit longer, love. This is quite fascinating.”
She kissed him goodnight and went to bed. She had hoped to be able to make love with him tonight, but they were both too tired and she wanted this to be perfect. Sighing, she slid under the covers and was asleep in seconds.
Downstairs, Giles finally realized his vision was playing out and closed the book, stretching till his joints popped. He went upstairs and entered the master bathroom to brush his teeth. Quietly so as not to disturb Buffy, he slid into bed next to her. She rolled toward him and he slipped his arms around her before drifting into a deep sleep himself.
Buffy woke just as the sun was rising. Something had disturbed her sleep enough to make her awaken. She listened and heard it again. Vomiting. Coming from the children’s room. Remembering the nurse had said to get Tara to the emergency room if she began vomiting, she leaped out of bed and ran to her old room.
Surprisingly, it wasn’t Tara who was still deeply asleep. Xander had crawled from the bed and knelt on the floor before collapsing and throwing up everything in his tiny belly. He looked up as she entered the room. “Mommy, sick!” He punctuated this by vomiting again. She picked him up and carried him to the bathroom. She made him rinse his mouth out and drink a few sips of water that immediately came back up. He clutched his stomach and barely made it to the toilet before having a bad attack of diarrhea. He was very hot and she found a temp strip in the medicine chest and stuck it to his forehead. The results weren’t good; 102 degrees was too hot.
By this time, Giles had heard the commotion and had come blearily out of the bedroom. “What’s the matter?”
“I think we have a tummy bug going on here, Giles. Can you take him? I’ve got to clean up in the bedroom.”
“Of course. Come here, Xander. Tell Daddy what’s wrong.”
She left the boy in good hands and went to clean up the mess. Thank God they hadn’t let him eat supper or this would have been worse. She disinfected the spot with Lysol, hoping that the girls wouldn’t also succumb to whatever germ had gotten to the small boy.
It turned out to be a forlorn hope. Within an hour, both girls had awakened with vomiting. She had gotten them to the bathroom in time, but she could see the next few hours weren’t going to be pleasant. Fortunately, the children dropped off to sleep after each bout of illness and she was able to do damage control. The only one not affected was Willow and Buffy had Giles take care of her.
“I think you should stay away from the other kids as much as possible, Rupert. I don’t think I could cope with four kids and you sick too.”
He looked reluctant, but finally agreed when she made him take the baby into the other room.
She cleaned herself up and went downstairs for some cold water. “Do you think you could take Willow to the shop with you today?”
“Shouldn’t I be of more use to you at home?”
“No, you and Will are still relatively unexposed. I’m hoping you can take care of her and she won’t get this. In fact, it might be a good idea for you guys to stay at your apartment for a few days.”
“And leave you to cope alone with three vomiting children? What if you fall ill yourself?”
“Slayers hardly ever get sick. I’ll be fine.”
“What about, um, us?” he said hesitantly. “I did remember to pick up those, um, supplies yesterday.”
She looked torn, then sighed. “The kids are going to have to come first. Shoot!” she frowned. “I can’t even kiss you goodbye. I’m probably crawling with germs.”
He huffed a bit, gathered up the baby paraphernalia and headed out the door, an angry and frustrated expression on his face. He felt like he was never allowed to have any time with Buffy at all: if it wasn’t for their incredibly meddlesome friends, they could be together right now. He growled. Looking down at Willow he told her that she was going to have an extremely great deal of making up to do for both him and Buffy, not to mention Tara, Anya and Xander. “I hope you remember this experience, Willow. Next time I tell you not to touch something, please believe me.”
The baby cooed and reached out and grabbed his nose. He pretended to bite her hand and she laughed and gurgled happily at this new game. He got to his shop and realized that he hadn’t eaten breakfast yet so he walked across the street to the café and grabbed a quick bite to eat. The waitress cooed over the baby and wanted to know if it was his. “In a certain manner of speaking, yes, you could say that she is mine.”
“Well, she looks just like you. I’ll bet you had reddish hair as a baby yourself, didn’t you?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea. I’d like a pot of tea, wheat toast, two eggs scrambled and a slice of ham.”
“You got it, hon.” She scribbled his order on a piece of paper and thrust the pencil behind her ear. In seconds he was provided with a pot of hottish water and a tea bag. He grimaced but made the best of the situation.
When he finished eating, he pulled out a bottle of formula for Willow and held her carefully while she drank down the disgusting mess. He burped her but forgot the cloth that Buffy always draped over her shoulder and so had to clean slightly curdled formula off his jacket. “Your mum is much better at this sort of thing,” he complained to the baby. It was becoming increasingly easy to picture Buffy as his wife and the children as his. His heart felt tender when he saw her cradling one of the children. When this was over, he would claim her as his. They could be married in reality and eventually they might be blessed with a child. It was a pleasant fantasy.
He paid the bill and then walked back to his shop. It was too early to open so he sat the baby on the table in her carrier and began working on the problem of the rock. Sometime later, a knock on the shop door caused him to look up. He glanced at the clock and realized that it was past time to open.
“I beg your pardon,” he told the customer. “We lost track of the time.”
“Sure, no problem.”
The woman was a regular enough customer that he vaguely recognized her. He didn’t realize that she mainly came around to flirt with him.
“What an adorable baby!” she exclaimed. “Are you minding her for someone?”
“My wife,” he said. “She was afraid the baby would catch whatever bug the other children have and didn’t want to take the chance.”
“You’re married?”
He couldn’t for the life of him explain why she sounded so disappointed. “Yes. Nearly four years now,” he elucidated after quickly calculating the girl’s ages.
“Oh, well, I won’t keep you long.” Suddenly she was all business. “I need a couple of consecrated candles and some smudge sticks.”
He rang up her purchase and went back to his books. Business was steady most of the morning so he didn’t get a chance to do very much research. He called Buffy during a lull. She said the kids hadn’t thrown up for almost an hour and everybody was currently resting.
“Can I come home tonight then?” he asked her plaintively.
“Not till it’s been at least 24 hours, Rupert. Spend the night at your place. Get some sleep and don’t forget to burp Will before you put her down.”
“Ah, yes. The burping.” He didn’t sound happy.
“You forgot the cloth, didn’t you?”
“Yes. We needn’t go into the ramifications of that mistake. Needless to say, I shan’t forget again.”
“Well, I gotta go. I hear one of the babies moving. Love ya!”
“I love you too, Buffy.” He realized he was speaking to a dial tone and hung up.