There's nothing more that Buffy hates than washing the dishes. When they lived in Sunnydale, she'd rinse them off and hide them in the oven on days when it was her turn. That actually worked out great until Dawn got ambitious and decided to cook one day. By the time the oven had finished pre-heating, two plastic cups and a plastic bowl had melted all over the other dishes, rendering them completely useless.

Still, as she reaches her hands into the soapy water again and again, she doesn't have any regrets. If swapping nightly patrols with Kennedy for dish duty was all she had to do to ensure she could stay home and take care of a recovering Faith, it was worth the unpleasantness.

They'd never expected Faith to live through the infection from the Polgara demon, but she'd miraculously pulled through and was back on the road to recovery. Slayer healing couldn't do anything about the venom, though, so they had to let it run its course.

When the dishes are finished and Willow is satisfied that the oven isn't full of incriminating evidence, Buffy bounds up the stairs and heads right to Faith's room. She knocks quietly before entering, laughing to herself when she sees Faith struggling to get a sweatshirt on over her head.

“Let me help you,” Buffy says, walking over and easily tugging the sweatshirt down over Faith's shoulders. That's when she notices the small traces of blood on her t-shirt. “Faith, you're bleeding.”

She anxiously lifts Faith's t-shirt, observing the stitches in her abdomen where the demon had slashed her.

“Ain't no big, B,” Faith says, quickly pushing Buffy's hands away. “Got a little too ambitious and tried to stretch a bit. Pulled a stitch or something but the bleeding stopped already.”

Buffy looks at her disapprovingly but says nothing, instead helping her back into bed. When Faith is suitably relaxed and comfortable, Buffy grabs the two Xbox controllers and plops down on the bed too, handing one to Faith.

“So what game will you be kicking my ass at tonight?”

Faith smiles because it's true. Buffy can kick the shit out of any foe and save the world a hundred times, but she can't figure out how to make her character block Faith's attacks for the life of her.

“Mortal Kombat.”

“Dibs on Scorpion!” Buffy yells and Faith groans aloud. Since she taught Buffy his secret move, the girl won't pick anyone but him. She likes when he yells, “Get over here!” which she normally says right along with him.

They settle in to play, sharing friendly jabs with their elbows as they try to out-do the other. After a short while passes and Faith hears Kennedy coming in from patrol, she steals a glance over at Buffy, chuckling internally at her dish-water wrinkled hands.

“I never thanked you,” Faith says suddenly, feeling a bit shy. “For what you did when I . . .” her words drop off as she looks down at her still-bandaged stomach.

“You're welcome,” Buffy says, looking from the TV to Faith with a small smile on her face. “Now . . . get over here!”

Faith looks to the TV quickly and sees Buffy using the secret move on her character, finally winning a round. Buffy whoops and cheers, doing a seated version of the Cabbage Patch dance.