@hellcheerweek
I reference this particular event in one of my previous Buffy oneshots. I didn't get time to write the whole thing but maybe I can finish it after the event.
“Halloween,” Robin says with relish, as they haul boxes. Although some are managing easier than others - Robin can carry three boxes of books with ease and Chrissy feels like her arms are about to drop off. “My night off.”
“Why is that again?” Eddie asks, saving Chrissy from having to do it. She doesn’t look up, even though she can almost feel the heat of his body from where their elbows are mere inches from each other.
She hadn’t expected this to happen when Eddie joined their group.
“The vamps think it’s too commercial,” Steve says, passing by. “Like it’s a cliche if they roam the streets when everyone is out in costume.”
“Huh,” Eddie says, resting a crystal ball in the palm of his hand. “You’d have thought it would be easier to sneak around while everyone else is dressed up.” Robin just shrugs.
“Who cares why they do it, I just know that I get to relax at home and watch Nightmare on Elm Street,” she says and rips through a cardboard lid to peer inside. “Uh…Murray, where do you want the assortment of chicken feet?”
“Why exactly are we sorting all of this junk?” Steve asks, and gets swatted around the head for his trouble.
“A fellow watcher retired and sent me all of his resources,” Murray says, as though he hadn’t just removed a few of Steve’s brain cells with a copy of Common Curses. “He thought I might have a use for them living on the Hellmouth.”
“Okay, but why send them to the school library?” Jonathan asks, sitting on one of the stairs as he sorts through yet another box. “Literally anyone could walk in and see…” He pulls what looks like a shrunken head out of the box with an obvious look of disgust. “Well, they might have some questions.”
“I wasn’t about to have them delivered to my house,” Murray says, pushing Chrissy aside so he can take a look at the contents of her box. “My neighbors are notoriously nosy and I don’t think I should leave ancient spell books and relics out on my porch all day.”
“Are any of them likely to come alive?” Eddie asks with interest, tossing the crystal ball from one hand to another.
“No, but if that ball gets too hot in the sun it will set my house on fire,” Murray says pointedly and snatches it right out of Eddie’s hands. “Spell books to my private collection in the back, everything else needs to be loaded into my car.”
“Some of these books look like they’re bound in skin,” Steve says doubtfully and Murray groans.
“It’s Halloween,” he says, gesturing to the orange and black sign above the counter, like they could miss it. Murray makes a minimal effort to decorate the library for the holiday - it’s not Chrissy’s favorite event but even she finds the skeleton wearing a paper hat a little sad. “Don’t you people have plans?”
“Taking my brother trick or treating,” Jonathan says, and judging by his expression, his box contains more shrunken heads.
“Band practice,” Eddie says.
“Eating and scary films!” Robin chimes in, lifting the last few boxes over her shoulder to bring them down to the front desk like they weigh nothing at all.
“Tina’s having a party,” Steve says, throwing himself down into a chair. But much like Chrissy, he doesn’t look to be racing out of the door. It’s been getting harder these days to care - about parties, about homecoming, about all of it. She knows what’s out there now. She’d much rather be with these people, watching Jonathan make faces and Robin be giddy about her night off.
“Great,” Murray says weakly as Robin puts the last few boxes down. Eddie tugs the nearest one open and lets out a shout of delight.
But Eddie only pretends to put it away, waiting until Murray’s back is turned before he whisks it out again.
“Isn’t it cool?” he says, his eyes bright. Chrissy risks a peek while he’s enraptured, watching his long fingers turn the horn around to admire it. “Look at these markings.”
“It’s nice,” Chrissy says, because she doesn’t really see the appeal. It has elaborate etchings and even she can recognise the symbols near the mouth as runes. “What’s it for?”
“They used to drink out of these,” Eddie says, still admiring it. “This one looks like it was made out of a real horn…” Chrissy makes a face out of sight of Eddie’s eyeline.
“Man,” Eddie says ruefully, holding the horn up to the light. For a second the runes look unusually bright, gleaming against the library’s overhead lighting. “If only Murray would let me have it.”
“What would you use it for?” Chrissy asks and he flashes her a grin.
“Drink Dr Pepper out of it?” he jokes, pretending to raise the horn to his lips. “Would give my D&D sessions a real air of drama.”
“You play while sitting on a throne,” Chrissy says, without thinking. “Don’t they have enough drama already?” Eddie pauses, lowering the horn.
“How do you know that?” he asks and Chrissy nearly lets the large chunk of amethyst slip from her fingers. Damn.
She’s kept her crush on Eddie pretty cool so far. Before he was just…Eddie. He was in the cafeteria, in the back of some of her classes, a vague memory from a middle school talent show. It was easy to keep at a distance.
And then he joined their party and it all got so much harder. Suddenly she’s very aware of him in a way that she hadn’t been before, and she’s picked up a few details about him that she probably shouldn’t know.
“I’ve been downstairs,” Chrissy fibs, picking up another book rather than looking at Eddie. “I’ve seen the drama storerooms, remember?”
“Ah,” Eddie says and puts down the horn. “You know…you’d be very welcome to come see us sometime. I know you don’t play and we don’t exactly get a lot of girls down there but…I’d like to see you.”
It’s not exactly a date invitation. But it sounds like something. She knows how seriously Eddie takes his role as head of the club and Dungeon master. He doesn’t just invite people to watch their campaigns.
“I’d like that,” she says, heart pounding in her chest. She might be wrong, and he’s just being polite. He might have no feelings for her at all.
But his pleased smile says something different.
She picks up a smaller box to put by the door - they’ve borrowed one of the AV club carts to move most of the boxes out to Murray’s car - when Eddie tenses. When she looks at him, his face is almost unrecognizable, frozen into a strange, stiff mask.
“Hey,” she says, because there’s something not right about that terrible stillness in his face. When he still doesn’t respond, she reaches out and rests her hand on his arm. “You okay?”
Eddie jerks suddenly, all of the tension easing out of his face. But he still looks pale, and probably not too different from how she looks after a vision.
“Yeah,” Eddie says, raising a hand to his head. Chrissy knows that gesture - she uses it every time she’s had a vision and the pounding in her head is worse than she wants to let on. “Fuck. Sorry. I just felt lightheaded for a second.”
“Maybe you should sit down,” Chrissy says anxiously. But he just smiles at her and shakes his head.
“I’m good,” he says, dropping the horn back into the box. “Probably just need to hit the vending machine. Let me take that. I’ll stop by one the way back from Murray’s car.”
“Are you sure?” Chrissy asks, as he removes the box from her arms and stacks it on top of his own.
“Promise. Red Bull and a Mars bar will fix it,” he says. Jonathan stops counting heads long enough to make a face.
“I doubt that would fix anything,” he says bluntly. “Fuck’s sake, Murray, how many fucking shrunken heads are in here?”
“Are they human?” Robin asks curiously, peering over the bannister. Jonathan shakes his head.
“Mostly birds,” he says ruefully. Eddie nudges Chrissy with his elbow, still balancing both boxes.
“Bet you never had conversations like this with your other friends,” he says, eyes bright. He loves all this, even with the blood and fear that they live with every day. A Dungeon Master finding out that monsters and magic really exists? He’d almost been unable to resist the chance to touch real spellbooks, watch real magic being cast. Steve had even offered to teach Eddie some basic magic to his complete delight.
“Not even,” Chrissy says and turns to the next box. They’re nearly done and she’s almost upset about it. She much prefers being here, in the light with her friends, breathing in the smell of old books and wood polish, rather than going home.
“I’ll be back,” Eddie says, and as he turns something strange reflects in his eyes, like headlights catching something in the glare of a beam on the road. The unearthly glow against the brightness before whatever it was scurries back into the undergrowth - certainly not a trait for anything human.
When Eddie returns he bought a packet of Twizzlers just for her and she forgets all about it.
