Chapter Five

One Month Later

“Why don’t you get in the bath with us?” Maggie asks pouting at Dawn.

“Because I got a shower earlier and I’m going patrolling with Uncle Spike and Uncle Angel after you guys go to bed.”

“When can we go patrol?” Alisa questions.

“The day after never.” Dawn responds, suddenly remind herself of Buffy.

Maggie blows raspberries at Dawn, “today’s no fun/”

“Why? “ Dawn asks.

“Everyone was gone, ‘cept for Aunt Fred, but she was workin’.” Maggie sighs.

“Yeah.” Alisa chimes.

“You guys know that everyone is busy try to fight the Big Bad.”

“It’s still boring.” Alisa retorts.

“Well I’m sorry,” Dawn responds, “now lets get your hair washed.”

“Can we use yours?” Maggie points to Dawn’s orange shampoo bottle.

“Sure.” Dawn responds grabbing Alisa and helping her to stand in the tub. Dawn’s back was beginning to ache from leaning over into the deep tub. After soaping Alisa’s hair she calls, “switch.” Dawn grabs at Maggie who slips easily through her fingers.

“Don’t wanna wash.”

Placing her hand on the wall opposing her Dawn silently curses the bathtub that was not intended to bath young children in. “Get in with us!” Alisa pull at Dawn’s shirt.

“Come on guys, knock it off.” Dawn begs realizing just how close she is to losing her balance. The knock on the door is the final straw and Dawn lands in the tub with a splash. “Come in!” Dawn calls on the verge of laughter.

“Um, Dawn?” Dawn is beyond startled by Connor sticking his head through the slightly cracked door.

Dawn quickly pulls herself out of the tub, “Connor, what are you going here?”

“A woman downstairs told me to come upstairs to the third door on the left. She didn’t mention that it was a bathroom. I didn’t mean to interrupt something.”

Dawn laughs, “it’s fine. We are just about done in here, two little girls need to go to bed.”

“But...”

“We’ve all ready had this discussion.” Dawn responds. “Connor you can sit in here or wait in my room, unless you need me right now.”

Connor shakes his head, “I’m not in a rush, I’ll wait in your room.”

“All right.”

“Um, where is it?”

“Oh, two more doors down on the right.”

Connor nods, “all right.”

“I’m sorry about that. If I’d known you were coming we would have skipped baths tonight.”

“I tried calling.”

“Yeah, Fred’s been on the phone and the internet all day. It’s fine though, let me change, I’m still soaking wet, they pulled me in.” Dawn quickly grabs a pair of pants and another shirt, she’d taken the doors off her closet and had put heavy curtains over them to give her an area to change. Quickly Dawn changes her clothes and then she pulls her wet hair into a pony tail as she changes she asks, “so what’s up Connor?”

“As nerdy as this is going to sound I was wondering if you’d read over this stupid short story for Latin.”

“Oh,” Dawn nods, “sure, that’s not problem.”

“What’s this?” Connor asks lifting up the heavy Turkish spell book Dawn had been pouring over trying to find a spell that would help Angel.

“Oh it’s just a book about ancient Turks, in Turkish.” Dawn responds realizing just how easy it had become for her to lie to people.

Connor shakes his head, “Turkish, you really amaze me sometimes Dawn.”

Dawn blushes, “thanks. So about this story, what’s it about?”

“Well the story is actually about a dream I had, it’s about two vampires who had a human child.” Connor responds. “Dumb, I guess.”

Dawn shakes her head, “it sounds interesting.”

“So you’ll check it out?” Connor asks.

Dawn nods with a smile, “sure, give it here.” Dawn reads the short story quickly, about the two vampires who for the most part hated each other and Dawn couldn’t help but get teary eyed at the end when the female vampire, near death, staked herself and let the baby live.

“It’s a beautiful story Connor.” Dawn responds honestly, although in the back of her mind she can’t help but think that it could never happen.

Connor smiles at Dawn, “thanks, I don’t even know where it comes from.”

“What are you doing tonight?” Dawn asks realizing that she no longer felt like patrolling, wrestling with the girls had tired her, although not so tired that she wanted to sit home and do nothing.

Connor shakes his head, “nothing.”

“You wanna go out and do something? I’ve been stuck in studying and baby-sitting.”

Connor nods, “all right, it sounds like fun. Want to see a movie?

Dawn makes a face, “I’m not sure why don’t we just figure it out as we go along.”

“I had a lot of fun tonight.” Connor states after walking Dawn to the door.

Dawn nods and smiles, “so did I. We should do it again.”

“Maybe without the disappearing drunk.” Connor gently touches the bruise forming on Dawn’s cheek, she’d had a run in with a vamp and had explained it away saying that it was a drunk who took off when he heard Connor coming.

Dawn looks up at Connor her eyes locking into Connor’s deep blue ones, “it doesn’t really hurt.” Dawn’s hand inadvertently cover Connor’s and they both stop for a minute until Connor leans in to kiss her.

“What the bloody hell is going on out here?” Spike comes out into the front porch minutes later to find Dawn still kissing Connor.

Dawn quickly jumps away from Connor and she turns to glare at Spike, “Spike!”

“I should go.” Connor stutters.

“That’s right you better sodding go.” Spike responds harshly, “and you better get inside.”

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