Daddykat's "Planning the Wedding"

Special thanks to Cally at DOUBLE RAINBOW for the beautiful layout and graphics!

Author: Daddykat rbenn@enter.net (a relative's address but all I have)
Title:_Planning the Wedding _
Rating: PG (brief mention of drug use)
Disclaimer: All characters mentioned herein (except Caleb) are property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy Productions, and associated companies. No remuneration is being received for this work.
Summary: I got to thinking about what lives the Buffyverse characters' counterparts might have had in a world without vampires, Watchers, Slayers, mighty magics, and earthbound demons. Here is one possibility.

Joyce shook her head and said, "The way it breaks down, I just won't be able to have any of my friends in the wedding party. We're a circle, I'm not much closer to one than to the rest, and since we're keeping it simple, I can't have them all. So there, I don't need a matron of honor. they'll be fine just sitting in the congregation and at the reception."

Rupert took off his glasses and said, "So, we'll do this with no one standing for either of us ? Sounds alright to me."

"No, sweetie, just like my first wedding, I'll have a maid of honor. My older daughter will stand for me."

"Sounds even better, luv. Our Buffy deserves a part in this ceremony since it wouldn't be happening without her."

"So you're saying we weren't destined for each other, " she mocked.

"We wouldn't know each other if I hadn't allowed her and her friends to use the library as their late afternoon hangout. Even then, it was dealing with . . . her problem, both of us trying to help her, that we discovered our real feelings for each other."

"God, last summer, when she slipped, and you were out of town and all, you wouldn't believe how scared I was, but she came back, she turned herself in for help. I'm so glad you taught her what you did about facing up to facts."

"It wouldn't have mattered a damn if you hadn't raised her to listen when someone spoke sense to her."

"Remember, she also listened when someone didn't speak sense, namely Liam."

"That rotten . . ."

"Rupert, don't be too hard on him. I think he really loved her, as far as he could with the same stuff in his veins as Buffy had and for so many more years. Yes, he was pimping her out, I'll never forget that, but he was no more capable of seeing it was wrong than she was. I've forgiven him, I've had to, a family member has a recovery of their own to make, just like the addict. Actually, I hope he's doing all right."

"He is. Anya told me Xander was talking to Cordelia a couple days past, about her coming to their wedding. She and Liam have been dating for several months, quite seriously, too. He hasn't touched heroin and she hasn't touched cocaine for over thirty months, since they both moved there, actually, which can be quite a trick in I.A."

"Rupert, believe me when I say I'm happy for both of them. I know Cordy and Buffy started as enemies, but they really helped each other out spring of their senior year. And Liam, I have to think of that as good news. Wishing bad for him would just hold me to the past, and I can't live there."

"Well, darling, your capacity to forgive is one reason I love you. I hope some of it's contagious."

"Finally, old Ripper is softening up."

"Please, don't remind me. Of course, now I need someone to stand for me. Since the best man serves as the maid of honor's escort, it should be someone Buffy enjoys being seen with. You may be surprised at my choice, but I can't think of anyone better suited than William."

"Just because he's English?"

"No, mainly because I believe Buffy's finally found 'The One.'"

"Do you really ? I thought you'd prefer Caleb, that guy who graduated the year after."

"Caleb is a fine man who adores Buffy, but I'm afraid she'll never see him as anything but a nice boy. no, as irritating as I found him when he first joined the English department, William's grown on me, and I understand what our girl sees in him."

"You're preaching to the choir, Mr. Giles. I was the first one to really start liking William, remember ? I was just surprised to find you ahead of me on this one."

"Having mentioned the Class of '99, we need to consider Willow. Anyone I'll be inviting is rather, shall we say, sophisticated ?"

"You'd better not !"

"Very well, then I'll say some of them are blasé and others just plain cynical about alternative love-styles. But, will any of your guests have any trouble seeing Willow with Tara ?"

"Willow and Tara have been out for quite a while now. If any guest has a problem, it's that guest's problem. As far as I'm concerned, they can complain to the bride. I have no trouble telling my friends where they can kiss if they're concerned about something that's none of their business."

"Joyce! Language!" he teased.

"Okay, now, as to the caterer. . . . "

THE END

Comments: A Watcher and the mother of a Slayer, by definition, have different goals for the girl's life. In the Buffyverse, this marriage couldn't have worked and the "real" Giles and Joyce were wise enough to know that, which is , I think, why they never pursued such a thing. I wanted to show their alternates as happy. As for why, in a vamp-free world, Joyce has 2 daughters, is divorced and in Sunnydale, why Giles is In America at all and not with Jenny, and why Liam, Anya, and William are even alive in this century, I don't know. A verbal puff pastry like this doesn't need a lot of back story. William's job as English teacher is a connection to the Bloody-Awful. I'm usually B/A rather than B/S, but I wanted to parallel the shows and I needed a past bad guy and current good guy anyway. Some of the sex-and-drug things were suggested by ideas in Keith Topping's book _Slayer_. The comment "Buffy's found 'The One'" is a salute to Amber Benson's movie _Chance_, which is about how hard that is. And THIS universe will have no the-operation-was-a-success-but-the-patient-died aneurysm for Joyce !