I hear Buffy hesitate.

"You're right," my eldest finally says. "This is a family thing, and you're family."

I can imagine Rupert's smile. Deep down he knows - I know - the girls know - that he's more their father than the man who contributed their second X-chromosomes.

I hear them come up the stairs, slowly, uncertainly. None of us are sure of what we should do, what we should say. I look up and see them in the doorway, my other baby girl and the man who pretends to be their father on a daily basis.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Dawn asks softly, her face turned away from me, almost hidden in stuffed animals and pillows.

I look at Buffy, not sure what to say, and she speaks for me. "We were going to. It just..."

Dawn gives her a Look.

Rupert speaks softly, gently. "We thought it best not to tell you so soon," he says. "To keep you safe, Dawn."

I look back at Dawn. "We thought it would be better if we..." I pause for a moment, searching for just the right words so that she won't be so angry, so upset, but I know it's useless. The truth, plain and simple, is the only way. "If we waited until you were older," I finish.

Dawn glances at me, at Rupert. "How old am I now?" she asks. There is a desperate tone in her voice. I can feel her pain - she's about ready to snap, and my heart hurts. Oh, God, whatever gods there are, I think quickly, if only you could tell me how to make this right again!

I swallow. "You're fourteen, sweetheart," I tell her. "You know that." I see Rupert nod in agreement in a mirror on the opposite wall.

"No," Dawn replies. She sniffs. "The monks. When did...when did they..."

Rupert steps forward, closer to the bed. "When did they bring you into this world, bring you to Buffy to be protected?" he asks. Again, his voice is as gentle as I can ever imagine it to be, gentler than I've ever heard it, even when his concern has been directed at Buffy.

Dawn nods, but there is an even madder, even more insane look developing in her eyes.

"Six months ago," Buffy tells her in a whisper.

I can see my little girl trying to hold back her tears. Hell, both of them are. There's that lump in the back of my throat, and my eyes are burning, too.

If Rupert's eyes water, I'm going to be done for. The floodgates will open and there will be no stopping it.

"I've only been alive for six months, huh?" Dawn says.

Still fighting those tears, I try to reassure her. "Honey, you've been alive a lot longer than that to us."

"You don't know that! You don't know anything. I'm, I'm just a key, right? Everything about me is made up!" Dawn yells.

Buffy tries sitting down next to her. "Dawn..." she begins, and then glances up at me, and at Rupert. I can feel his approval at her attempt to help. "Mom and I know what we feel," Buffy continues. "We all do."

"We all do, Dawn, everyone of us," Rupert adds. "We all love you so very much."

I try to speak, but the pain is in my eyes, my mind, my throat, my jaw. I can't open my mouth to speak.

"I love you, Dawn," Buffy tells her. "I know I care I about you. I *do* care about you. I worry about you-"

Dawn cuts her off. "You worry about me because you have to. I'm your job! Protect the key, right?" There's an edge of sad sarcasm to her words. I still cannot speak.

"I *worry*," Buffy says, putting all her love and pain into that one word, "because *my sister* is *cutting* herself!"

Dawn tries not to be effected by this. "Yeah? How do you know?" she asks. "Maybe this is just another *fake* memory from my *fake* family!"

Oh, Dawn, I think, if only it were that simple. If only what you're saying were true. If only I didn't know, in my mind, my body, my very *soul*, that you were really mine...

"Dawn," Rupert says softly. I see him in the mirror again, and it looks like he's going to say something more, but thinks better of it.

"Sweetheart," I finally say, finally force the pain and the lump in my throat out long enough to say those two syllables.

"Get. Out," Dawn growls, interrupting me.

"Dawn-" Buffy tries again, but Dawn begins to yell, to scream:

"Get out, get out, get out!"

By the time she's finished, it's more a shriek than anything human, not at all intelligible. The pain is too much, and my legs stand me up without my thinking about it. Dawn curls up with one of her stuffed animals, and I think to myself, Why my baby girl? Why Dawn?

I receive no answer, and Buffy moves to leave. A feeling of defeat overcomes me, and I begin to follow her.

Without my realizing it, Rupert takes my place on the bed. Dawn is still crying, and doesn't seem to notice his presence.

She doesn't even react when he begins to sing.
 

Sleep, my child, and peace attend thee
All through the night
Guardian angels God will send thee
All through the night
Soft the drowsy hours are creeping
Hill and dale in slumber sleeping
I my loving vigil keeping
All through the night

I has been so long since I have heard him sing. Have I ever heard him sound so sad, or so in love, so deeply in fatherly love for one of my girls?
 

While the moon her watch is keeping
All through the night
While the weary world is sleeping
All through the night
O'er thy spirit gently stealing
Visions of delight revealing
Breathes a pure and holy feeling
All through the night

Hank never sang to them, even when they asked. He never sang, never told them bedtimes stories, never allowed himself to just be Daddy.
 

Though I roam a minstrel lonely
All through the night
My true harp shall praise sing only
All through the night
Love's young dream, alas, is over
Yet my strains of love shall hover
Near the presence of my lover
All through the night

What miracle is this that I have been blessed with? What holiness have I helped bring into the world to have such a man act as father to my children without asking? I am the mother of the Slayer, mother of the Key, but not by choice. I would give the world to have my babies be nothing but normal girls. Is there something about *me* that brings these blessed creatures into my keeping?
 

Hark, a solemn bell is ringing
Clear through the night
Thou, my love, art heavenward winging
Home through the night
Earthly dust from off thee shaken
Soul immortal shalt thou awaken
With thy last dim journey taken
Home through the night

I know that my questions will never be answered, and for now it's all right that I don't know.

Dawn stays curled up on her bed. She's stopped crying, but she's still too upset to acknowledge us again. I lay my hand on Rupert's shoulder, and he turns his face towards me. I see his tears, but I still smile.

Thank you, I want to say. Thank you, Rupert, thank you for everything, thank you for being the perfect father for them, thank you for the friendship you've offered me, I want to tell him.

But I only smile at him, a sweet little smile, and he nods in understanding. I wish I could understand, wish I could hear what he's thinking right now, but smiles and nods will have to do.

He stands and we follow Buffy back downstairs. We three clean the lower floor quietly, pick up the remnants of Buffy's birthday. I hug my eldest close to me when we are finished and mentally recount all of the terrible things that have coincided with her birthday. She's only twenty. So many awful things, and to be honest, for her, this has been the worst, even worse than the incident with Angel. She and Dawn have always been so close....I *remember* that they have been close...even though they've often denied it, as girls their age sometimes do.

Buffy goes up to bed, saying she's too tired to go out and patrol. Rupert gives her that same sad smile, hugs her, tells her it will still be okay.

She doesn't even try to grin, to smile at him. She just shakes her head and climbs the stairs.
 
 

Rupert and I drink our tea silently. Then I begin to cry, and I can't stop. He comes around the island and embraces me, holds me close. Brushes my hair with his hand. "Shh," he whispers, "shh. It's all right." He rocks slightly as he holds me.

Hank was never so kind.

For a moment I wonder if it was just the candy and coincidence, circumstance, that drew me to him all those months ago, years ago now.
 
 

Rupert insists on staying the night, insists on taking the couch, so that he can help in the morning when Dawn wakes.

I'm too tired to argue, to tell him we'll handle it fine on our own, which I know is not true.

Instead I thank him. I look at him, at his eyes, a moment longer than needed and then smile.

Thank you, I think to whatever being controls the universe, whatever gods there might be. Thank you for sending their true father to them.

I begin to climb the stairs, and then look back at him. I smile and then continue on my way.

As I climb into bed, pull the blankets over me, I whisper it aloud. "Thank you."

I almost think I hear a reply.

I write it off to exhaustion, but even as I begin to drift off into sleep, a little part of me holds onto that wish.

For the first time in weeks, my dreams are pleasant.