Poof

Poof (Part Nine)
*******

Starting awake, Buffy opened her eyes. For a moment, she lay there disoriented, unsure of exactly where she watifltifling a groan, she raised herself up on her elbows and looked around the room. Riley's, she was at Riley's, in Riley's bed because last night. Right. Last night. Pulling the covers aside, Buffy got dressed. As she finished, she glanced down at Riley, safe and asleep, his head cradled in his arms looking as though he had not a care in the world. And why would he? He kept the world safe from evil subterranean creatures. He had a tank and he was from Iowa. All those combined, assured Riley of a nice and even sleep. That, and he was probably under orders from Maggie Walsh to get a good night's sleep. Riley was a good solider boy. Riley was her nice and normal boyfriend. Riley-was an absolute bore in bed.

Not the stuff to think about, Buffy thought, chastising herself. Nope not a good thing. Her hand drifted down to Riley's cheek, not touching it, but ghosting over his skin. With a final look to Riley, she opened the door of his room and left his room, and went as fast as she could back to her dorm across the campus.

Once back in her own room, Buffy got her shower caddy, stripped again, tossing her clothes into the hamper, got into her robe, which was no where near as comfortable as the Hefrobe, and went to shower. At 5:30 am, there was little competition for the nice shower. Standing under theeam eam of hot water, Buffy tried to wash the memories of the night away, didn't work but at least she smelled nice.

She never felt comfortable using Riley's bathroom, something about the military thing. For whatever reason, Riley was really weird about waste disposal. When they had sex, Riley would take the used condom, and instead of dropping it in the trash, he would make a nice little knot in it and put it in a little box that reminded her of a hazardous waste disposal box. All that was missing was for it to be colored yellow with a radiation-warning label on the front. Kleenex went in there too. Buffy supposed that was why she never really got into the grove of showering, or for that matter, doing anything in Riley's bathroom. Who knew where the stuff ended up? Probablysomesome government lab, where it was measured and catalogued. Not something Buffy wanted to happen. She had been freaked enough already at the concept of using a bathroom within hearing distance of Riley, the thought that somewhere there were vials filled with Buffy debris really creeped her out.

Finished with her shower, she made her way back to the room, careful not to disturb Willow. Willow, her best friend, who was sleeping the sleep of the good and the just: not of the, hello, she'd slept with two guys in less than twenty-four hours. Right after the other. This was another one of those things not to tell the kids, or the mom. Ever. Bugot got dressed, brushed out her hair and started to read some of her assignments, because she was in college, and studying was a necessity. Plus, she really needed to talk to Willow, or someone. The problem being, if she went over to the other person she talked things over with, the rate things were going, they wouldn't talk. For all of the complaints she might have had about the lack of communication between Giles and herself, their recent rash of non-verbal communication, was, within the realm of her vast experience, normal.

It was just a little outside the Time/Life Monster Books.

Maybe they needed boundaries.

Or to spank each other.

They hadn't done anything like that, yet.

Buffy blushed, trying to get out of her head the image of Giles, leather, and whips. She probably shouldn't have gone to dorm porn night last week.

They just needed to do define things. Get some idea about the seriousness of what they were doing.

Wouldn't that take all the fun out of things, thought Buffy, as she waded through Norton anthology chapters for her literature class. Spanking, not the thing to think about while reading Henry Miller excerpts.

Somewhere around seven, Willow awoke from her non-guilty sleep and mumbled a "morning" to Buffy. This was before her mind switched to on and thoughts of ritual recaps hit her brain.

"Buffy!" cried Willow, jumping over to Buffy's bed in her happy flannel pajamas, "tell me everything."

"About?" asked Buffy, paling at the thought of explaining after-ritual sex with Giles and then after-Giles sex with Riley. But this was Willow, she of the brain. Willow would be able to help her make sense of everything that had happened, Willow would know what to do. Willow would want to help. At that, Buffy gave a little shudder, because the last time Willow had wanted to help, that had not been a good thing.

"Well," stalled Buffy, not really sure of how to begin. Thinking wistfully of the library and how she should have hid out there until class, thus avoiding the conversation she needed to have but didn't want to have.

"What happened with the Gnarch ritual? Was it cool? How did it work? I guess it worked alright because, no more demon, but what happened?"

"We did the thing," had cosmic sex with Giles, Buffy's brain supplied, deciding to offer up a running commentary on the subject, "the demon went poof, or splat, and then I went and had sex with Riley. You probably shouldn't eat jelly donuts for a week or so."

"Sorry?"

"Well, right after I had wit with Giles," not ritual sex, but non-purpose sex her brain continued, "I slept with Riley."

"So? He's your boyfriend. You have sex with him. Before? The Ritual? Didn't you? I mean, that wasn't the first time you've had sex with Riley was it? Because, I thought you two had done that already."

"No, I mean, yes. Did the, umm, sex with Riley before. But I had sex with two different men on the same day. That's not a good thing. Is it?" With Giles, sex had been wild and… Buffy couldn't think of other words, Giles was synonym man. Word guy. Tongue man. Bad brain! Thought Buffy.

Riley sex had seemed like a military exercise in which cadence had been recited. 'This is my rifle, this is my gun, one is for fighting, and one is for fun.' She really needed to stop letting Xander pick out the group movies. Maybe it wasn't fair to compare the two. Giles wasn't in the military; he didn't have to march around. In a tank. Giles wasn't into penis related ego trips. He seemed comfortable with his abilities, and he really didn't have much to worry about. No wonder her Mom had thought about Giles for months afterwards. She'd had sex with someone her mother had sex with. Taking the bonding thing too far, her brain supplied. Maybe she should go over to her Mom's this weekend for waffles, and compare notes, on Giles. Maybe you should go back into your corner thought Buffy to her brain, you aren't doing me any good hanging around here. Willow could think this through.

"Will, when you were doing the Oz and Xander thing, how did you feel?" asked Buffy, startling Willoto lto looking at Buffy and blushing.

"That's not the same thing. I mean Xander and I were, we were, finishing up what we had as kids, from when we were, six. It was an end to the sexual ten, no, not that there was tension when we were kids, it was just after, seventh grade, and even then it wasn't sexual. Took us awhile to get there, but before, anyway." Willow flustered and continued. "You and Riley, this is nothing like that. Plus, when he saw me with Oz, he got a clue, and, I'd always crushed on him, but Oz. Tara was after Oz and the werewolf skank, so it really wasn't anything bad. Not really. Besides, it wasn't as if we had to kill a demon or any thing. You and Giles had to do this. It's only natural that you'd go to Riley afterwards, I mean, hello, sex with Giles." She concluded with a little shudder.

Buffy glared at Willow, "Will, he wasn't…" and then she caught herself.

Willow glanced at the clock, gave a quick squeak and grabbed her shower caddy and left the room, oblivious to the fact that Buffy paled at the last comments she had made. Because she had, cheated on Riley, with Giles. She hadn't even thought about it. Certainly not one thought had been spared to Riley during sex with Giles. Not during the ritual, after the ritual and next day sex with Giles. After Giles, sex with Riley had invoked many comparisons between Solider sex and Watcher sex. If she had to score it, Riley sex wouldn't even make it in the plus column. Neither would Parker sex. Angel sex, well, that had all been about the First Time sex, so that was in a special place. Which was associated with really bad things, because after-Angel sex was filled with chaos, death and killing.

Giles had scars. Scars from Angel, inside too. She knew it. As much as she knew that she couldn't ask Giles about Angel and the whole torture thing. Could she? Wasn't it too late?

Actually it was pretty early. A bagel, juice and coffee sounded nice, breakfast, the most important meal of the day. Followed by class and normal college things. Maybe she would see her Mom. She really felt as if some Mom bonding was in order. That, or waffles, it was the weekend. She could use a break from campus, Riley, Willow wanting details, and this urge to go over to her Watcher and well, have sex. Food, everything would look clearer after a bagel. She got up, stuffed her books in her bag and left the room, off for food, erudite discussion on literature, and absolute avoidance of everything male. Maybe, Willow had a point, dating women seemed less complicated. But then, she wasn't, dating, Giles. It wasn't dating. It was sex, cosmic sex, fun and wild, but it wasn't dating, she had no idea what to call it, but dating they weren't. With a shake of her head she headed out the door, everything would look better after breakfast. All she needed was some perspective, distance and above all, no going over to Giles'.

******

Buffy headed back over to the campus that Sunday feeling very nice. She'd spent the entire weekend with the Mom, girl talk, homemade food and sleeping in her nice safe bed. There'd been slayage, waffles and great movies, nothing like a little Cary Grant in the evening. She had been able to duck calls from Riley, who hadn't sounded too upset, Rilef itf it was possible, sounded absolutely perky. The Initiative was going to be able to keep the tank toy. They were going off on maneuvers next week to practice driving and firing the tank. Riley sounded very happy in his manly operating mode, and not the least bit upset when Buffy had told him she'd wanted to spend some quality time with Mom. She felt a little irked at that. Riley should have at least made a few token protest noises. Instead, he had happily agreed and she heard Graham, in the background, telling Riley to shake a leg, because the truck to the firing range was leaving in a few minutes.

She walked over to the campus, in the calm of the Sunday afternoon, the light breeze feeling cool over her body when she saw the figure jogging ahead of her. The mad-jogger, no that wasn't quite right, anyway, the jogging Watcher. Before her brain could switch on and remind her about the previous resolution to avoid all things Giles, she called out to him.

"Giles!" Well that was original, thought Buffy. It did, however, get the point across, as the Watcher jogger trotted right on up to her. There he was, in front of her, looking all mussed and cute. Giles, in sweatpants, t-shirt and sneakers, the very image of the modern major jogger. The only thing that would improve the image would be Giles, in shorts, jogging away from her. Good thing it wasn't New Year, her resolutions would be toast.

"Toast?" asked Giles.

Whoops, "Nothing. Enjoying the jog?"

"Just fine."

Buffy looked at Giles, and was hit by a sudden flash of inspiration. Something to propose to Giles, which had absolutely nothing to do with sex, not in the least. Not only that, it was the politer thing to say, a mature way of speaking to Giles. So, in true Buffy fashion, she went for it. "Do you want to get some water?"

"Well, I was going to finish up and head over to my flat." Giles said, squinting myopically in the vague direction of his apartment. Glasses it seemed were not a part of the serious mad Watcher jogger uniform.

"Giles, it's hot outside, well not hot, but enough that you look like you need some water. I've got some, in my fridge, want to cool down and have a drink with me." There, that was polite, the Espresso Pump was still down for repairs, negating the coffee option. Not really thinking about why she wanted a private drink with Giles, she just thought it would be polite to invite him for a drink. He looked hot, flushed, and in need of liquids.

"You know Giles, you look like you need to ingest some fluids."

He gave her a look, but fell in step beside her and walked with her to her dorm and into her room. She went to the fridge to get two bottles and handed one to Giles, who was circling the room with an amused look on his face.

"What?" she asked.

"Thanks," he replied, opening the water and drinking it, "well, the last time I was in here, you had decorated the room with some very interesting cave art. I'm surprised you didn't keep the drawings, the walls look a bit, well, plain."

"Well, we had to repaint, otherwise we would lose our deposit."

"Ahh."

"So, does this bring back memories?"

"Of what?"

"Well, college, dorm rooms, you know."

"Not really, it's a bit sterile."

Buffy looked around the room, seeing the cubicle like room, bypassing the fact that neither her bed nor Willow's looked used. Giles gave her a quick grin and leaned against her desk, finishing the water. Buffy tried to ignore the sight of slightly sweaty Giles, leaning against her desk in her empty dorm room. She failed miserably when she circled around the room to stop right in front of Giles.

She ran a finger down Giles' shirt to his waist and back up to the stretched out neck of his t-shirt. This non-tweedy, slacker Giles had probably burnt up all things tweed in a mass-exorcism. That, combined with the new glasses, earring that had taken up permanent residence in his ear, and the casual wear, all combined to make Giles very approachable. She left him, went to lock the door, and shivered as Giles came up behind her and ran a finger down her back.

The next thing she knew, Giles was kissing her neck, moving aside her hair with his hand and pressing his lips against her nape. Her back arched away from him as one of his hands grasped her arm, the other resting against the door as he continued to lay kisses against her neck. Her palms pressed to either side of her, against the door, as Giles moved down her back, kissing her back through her dress. His hand left her arm, leaving goose bumps in his wake and moved to the button fastening her dress. She felt his fingers brush against her back as he undid the button opening her dress. It hung loosely off her frame as Giles dropped to his knees behind her and ran a hand up each leg, from her ankles, to just inside the hem of her dress. Buffy gave a groan, because in the spirit that she was now a college student, she had forgone the short skirts of high school, for the still stylish, but longer skirts. His hands stopped short of where she wanted them, and she found herself pushing back into Giles' hands as he ran them up and down her legs again.

"Giles," Buffy groaned.

He giggled, stood back up anew hew her dress off her shoulders, down her arms, until it slid off her body, leaving her facing the door in nothing but her underwear. Buffy's head was against the door, turned slightly to the right and Giles repeated the kisses down her back, his lips warm against her bare skin. Her hand reached up and she quickly drew the chain and turned to him, falling down into his arms. His shirt was damp against her skin and she pulled it off, as they sat on the floor. Buffy scrambled up and straddled him, beginning to undulate against him, feeling him harden beneath her. His hands came up behind her, pulling her closer against him, rocking up into her. His mouth pressed against her shoulder as her hands went up into the back of his hair, feeling the damp ends.

Giles slid one of his hands into the back of her panties and his fingers pressed between her cheeks, rubbing up and down. He groaned against her skin and removed his hands and squirmed out freneaeneath her, kicking off his sneakers, toeing off his socks and pulling off his sweats and underwear. Buffy sat on the carpet watching Giles strip and pulled off her own panties. Naked, Giles pulled her to him and rolled them over on the rug. She licked her palm and ran her hand between their bodies and over and around his cock, pulling on it until he was fully erect. Her legs came up as Giles knelt between them. Her head tilted up and her hand guided his tip to her opening. Their eyes met, Buffy gave Giles an evil smile and moved his cock up and down over her labia, never letting go of his shaft, not letting him enter her.

His hips began to move and his penis slipped from her grasp and he moved over her, supporting his weight on his arms. Giles continued the movements she had begun, running his cock over the outside of her vagina, never entering her, brushing up against her clitoris, his pre-come mingling with her juices and wetting his shaft. Suddenly, he gave a quick thrust and entered her. Buffy pulled his head down to hers and her legs wrapped around him. Giles began making quick and sharp thrusts into her, the force of them, moving them across the rug. Upon hearing Buffy moan, he moved his hands from her sides to brace himself on his elbows, stopping their movement. They breathed hotly against the other as Giles thrust deeper into her. Buffy moaned, swallowing it, trying to keep quiet as her orgasm took her by surprise, making her pulse with the rhythm of Giles' thrusts. He lifted his head and arched an eyebrow at her. Buffy tried to regain her breath, and her breasts shook with the pace Giles had set, as she panted out between breaths, "thin walls."

Giles tried to laugh, but it turned into a groan as he put his head back down and muffled his cries against her neck as his movements became uneven. Her legs moved higher onto his back and it felt like his penis brushed against her cervix with each movement. His frenetic thrusts inside her changed as he began to rock back and forth, rubbing against her clitoris each time. This time Buffy knew her orgasm was coming as it built from her very core, to each limb. Sweat coated her skin as she a pul pulsed around him, her juices flowing out of her. Just as she reached the apex, Giles stilled and held her close, melding their bodies together as he spurted again and again inside her.

They stayed together joined for what seemed an eternity, chests moving as one, against the other. Giles lifted his head and looked into her eyes and kissed her, softly against her lips, ghosting his lips against hers, in contrast to the frantic motions of their coupling. He lifted himself off her, pushing off with one arm, as her legs fell to either side of him. Crouching on his knees, between her legs, his hands ran up and down her thighs, to her vagina, drawing out the aftershocks of her orgasm by lightly brushing his fingers through her wet hair.

Giles finally sat back, his cock softening and rubbed her foot. Buffy pulled her foot away and sat up as well looking at Giles from a short distance apart.

"Missed you this weekend," was all she could say.

Giles laughed and pulled her to him, encircling her with his arms as they kissed once again.

****

She fohersherself lying on her side looking at Giles, now prone on the floor. Her head was propped up on her hand as she ran the other across Giles' chest. Giles, to his credit, wasn't even squirming on the cheapo carpet she and Willow had picked up at the local farmers' market. Giles was in fact, doing a passable imitation to a very sated cat. Who'd just had a really big bowl of cream? He sat up and looked over to the clock and sat up, wincing a bit at the movement.

"Stiff?"

Giles gave her a wry look, lessened slightly by the fact he was grinning, "Buffy."

"I didn't mean that, not like that. Well, sort of like that, but not really. I mean, Giles, I had sex with Riley." Not exactly what she'd meant to say, but since she wasn't sure what she was going to say, that simply just came out.

There it was, out there, on the floor. With them. All of a sudden, she felt the floor become a lot more uncomfortable, she felt like squirming. Giles, to her surprise was still looking calm, controlled and not annoyed. And he should, thought Buffy; he should fsomesomething. She'd seen him get more worked up when his Time-Life monster books were late. Buffy felt her cheeks begin to get flushed, in anger this time, and tried to force herself to calm down, using deep breathing exercises that she'd learnt from the doofus on her floor, who wasn't reacting to anything.

She wanted a quarterstaff.

Giles actually reached up to his face for his glasses before realizing that said glasses were back at the apartment, probably with his brain. Because he wasn't saying anything. He was, in action Giles mode, getting up and getting dressed, and then sitting on her bed looking down at her. Buffy got up, and got dressed, in some clean clothes, with a fair amount of noise, stomping and banging around, and sat opposite Giles on Willow's bed. Giles looked at her with his hands clasped over his knees.

"And?" He very calmly said.

"What?" Buffy answered, starting to get angrier. Giles was being way too calm about this.

"Giles, I slept with Riley."

"Yes, I heard you the first time, again, so?"

"Don't you care?"

"He's not hurting you is he?"

"No, nothing like that, but Giles, I slept with Riley."

"So you keep saying," Giles said, sounding annoyed. "You," at this Giles again tried to clean the non-existent glasses, Buffy got up and handed Giles a throwing knife and cloth out of the weapons chest, he looked desperate to clean something and there was some unidentified demon debris on the knife She'd forgotten to clean the thing, so the stuff was just caked on, just the thing for the idiot on her bed. Giles gave her a look of thanks and moved up to the head of her bed, Buffy, joined him and glared at him. Giles looked down and started wiping the blade clean. He looked at her with a grin, and repeated the word, "and?"

"And, and, and. Giles, you're the verbose one." Giles looked at her in surprise. Buffy ranted on, "See, college. The best place to use the multi-syllabic word I learnt for the SATs. You, however, seem to have sunk to the conversation level of a toddler. Giles," Buffy enunciated clearly, "I slept with him."

"Riley."

"No, Spike, eww," both she and Giles grimaced at the thought, Buffy just knew Giles was working on not discussing this. "Giles," she sighed at him, and plucked the knife out of his hand tossing it in the direction of the wall where it embedded itself to the hilt.

"You'll lose your deposit."

"What?" Buffy looked at Giles in exasperation, for all of this, she was definitely beginning to lose the thread of the conversation.

"The wall, won't you lose the deposit? There's a hole in the wall." Said Giles while stretching out and wiggling his toes before plunking his feet in Buffy's lap.

"Giles," she sighed, looking down at her hands, which were contributing to the unknown foot fetish and had begun to caress his toes. Which were, perfect, in a foot kind of way. Not something that she'd thought about before, and there it was, he'd changed the subject. Buffy looked down at her hands and Giles' foot, and thought back to the argument she had with Giles prior to the ritual.

"Giles," she tried again, "I slept with Riley this weekend."

Giles looked at her, completely nonplussed and again said, "and?"

Right, he was in total denial. She pushed his feet off her lap, and moved up until she was leaning over him, face to face.

"Giles, I'm cheating, on you, with Riley."

"Isn't it the other way around?"

She sat back a bit and landed on Giles looking at him like he'd grown an extra eye.

"Well, technically," Buffy said.

"Technically?" answered Giles.

Buffy thunked him across his chest. She sat back, thinking. She was cheating on Riley with Giles. Paling at the thought, she looked down at his chest and his shirt. The hem of the shirt had rucked up from her movements on Giles, showing a bit of his stomach.

"Buffy," he said, lifting her face up and cupping her cheek in his palm. He sighed and continued, "Buffy, you have a relationship with Riley, you had it before this, you have it now."

"Well, what do you call what we're doing?"

Finally. Giles looked a bit uncomfortable. He tried to look away, and she held his face in her hand, making him meet her eyes.

"I don't know. It's, I don't know. Are you enjoying it? I mean… you don't feel like you have to do this. Do you? I thought we were enjoying this."

"What is this?"

"Enjoying each other's company without worrying about anything. Something without consequences, without-" Giles just stopped and looked at Buffy, clearly at a loss at what to say.

"Without emotions?"

"No, never that. But Buffy, you must realize that, this, it's fun, if you would wish for it to stop, for this not to happen again, it won't."

"What happens to us?"

"Nothing." Giles pressed on, paling a bit at the look in Buffy's eye. "Buffy, I don't know how to put this. I'll always be here for you. Whether or not you want to keep, well, having sex. I enjoy being with you. I enjoy this. But if it makes you uncomfortable, we'll stop. Go on as before. I don't want to ruin your life, your relationships; I just want you to enjoy yourself. Feel free."

"So I just use you?"

"Perhaps we use each other, without worrying about any emotional consequences."

"Is that what you want?"

Giles just looked at her, calmly, without a worry, she wanted to thrash him, with a whip, in an entirely non-erotic fashion.

Buffy looked at him, got up, walked over to her desk looking at Giles. She dug the knife out of the wall, turning it over, looking at the shiny, clean blade. He was apparently good for something. Many things.

"Giles, why are you doing this?"

Giles looked at her with a smile, got up and walked over to her, grabbing his shoes and socks as he went. He pulled out her chair, and put them on. Standing up, he moved into her space and removed the knife from her hands, putting it back into the chest. He faced her again. "Buffy, I just want you to feel free, I want to give you the freedom you deserve. I don't want to put any pressure on you." He went to the door and unlocked it, turning to her as he went, "I just want you to be happy Buffy." With that, he left her room.

Buffy walked to the window, watched as Giles appeared from her dorm, walked a bit down the path, and soon broke into a jog.

"What do you want Giles?" she asked to the empty room, leaning her head against the window, watching until she couldn't see him anymore. She sighed, turned from the window, cleaned up the room and went to shower. She had homework due next week. Might as well get a good start on it.

*****

Buffy woke up Monday morning with a renewed sense of purpose. The plan for the day was go on over to Giles' have it out with her Watcher, go to her afternoon Psych class, slay a few vampires; then head on over to Riley's for the update on the weekend. The only thing off the agenda was sex. No sex with Giles, none with Riley and her life would go back to normal. She'd take a few weeks off from the sexual revolution she'd fallen into, and things would settle down. That resolution lasted all of ten minutes.

She'd stormed into Giles' looking for the enigmatic Watcher, who'd simply discounted all her concerns the previous day. A quick cruise around the apartment produced not one sign of her Watcher. A pause to listen outside the bathroom door, revealed a shower running to the accompaniment of humming. Buffy walked into the bathroom, into a room filled with the fragrant scent of sandalwood, and to the arousing sight of Giles in the shower, all nice and soapy. Buffy felt her mouth dry out and crossed out a few resolutions on her list. Her new fangled ideas lasted about five minutes longer than her New Years' resolutions.

Without taking her eyes off the sight before her, she stripped out of her clothes and stepped into the tub. Throughout her activities, Giles peered through the steam and soap and watched her. He took a step back, directly under the water stream and drew her into the circle of his arms as she joined him under the water. Buffy turned and leaned back into Giles' chest, tilting her head back and letting the water sluice down her hair.

Giles circled his arms around her and held her close to his chest as her head rested against him. Buffy grew heady, as the fragrant steam surrounded her. She arched against Giles as his arms her her for a moment reaching for the soap. The bar was so new she could still make out the brand name, Ayahis, looked greek to her.

Giles began to soap her from behind, his hands moving over her torso with care, as her body became covered in the fragrant suds. Buffy held onto Giles' upper arms and spread her legs as Giles moved his hands closer to her center. She felt his hardness from behind and his hips thrusting against her.

His fingers dipped inside her and the water continued to rain down on them as Giles inserted one finger into her hot moist center and caressed her clit with his thumb, He braced his legs against the side of the tub and continued to thrust against her back. Sooner than she expected, her back was wet with the evidence of Giles' orgasm. He turned her around and knelt at her feet. This time it was Buffy, looking for purchase against the walls of the tub as Giles ran his tongue inside and out of her. His hands supported her as she came to the rhythm of the water, pulsing.

Bufas ras rooting in Giles' fridge before she realized that this had solved absolutely nothing. For the first time since all this had started, despite the shower, she felt, just a little, dirty.

*****


-end nine-