TITLE: Freaked

AUTHOR: Jos Mous

Email: wotan_anubis@yahoo.com

DISCLAIMER: I don’t own any of these characters, no profit is being made

PAIRING: Dawn/Kit

RATING: PG-13

NOTE: Just saw “Lessons”, so spoilers for that ep. Otherwise, not a lot.

Dear Diary,

I cannot believe I’ve started writing in one again. I mean, c’mon I burned all the others I had a couple of years age and now, here I am, a month into High School and I’m writing in a diary. Maybe I am as weird as the entire school thinks I am. Anyway, my name’s Dawn Summers and that’s all you need to know for now. You’d probably figure out what kind of girl I am soon enough.

Sooner than me anyway.

So… where to start. First day of school is probably the best time, even though I don’t like talking about. It’s not because I got chased by evil zombie ghosts. I get chased by evil things from beyond all the time. No, I don’t like talking about it because my sister totally ruined any chance I might’ve had at getting some friends. Ugh, I’m still shivering even thinking about it. Long story short, everyone in school thinks I’m weird and to be avoided. I suppose I should be grateful for the fact that this also means the cheerleader bitches don’t dare approach me, not even to insult me. Guess I should be thankful for small favours.

No, I much rather remember the whole “getting chased by zombies” episode. I actually got two friends out of that deal. Mostly, because they were chased by the zombies as well, but I’m not going to argue.

So, first we have Carlos Trejo. He’s pretty cool. Tries to give off this “tough-guy” attitude by smoking and picking on people who’re smaller than him. Actually, that’s not very cool. But he gave up on picking on smaller people, so that’s sorta OK. He’s not too bright though. Fun to hang out with, but don’t try to start up a meaningful conversation with him.

Then we have Kit Holburn. I don’t know what to think of her. I thought I had her pegged well enough. Goth-type girl. Bad childhood, generally depressed, cynical attitude to cover up inner insecurity and self-loathing. Pretty standard, really. She’s pretty smart too, but she mostly uses her intelligence to come up with scathing counter-insults.

Maybe that’s why the cheerleaders don’t bother us.

Anyway, what I really want to say, what’s probably the reason I’m giving this whole diary thing another go, is because… well… something sort of happened and I’m not quite sure who to talk to about it.

It was after school and Buffy wasn’t there to pick me up, so I had to walk home. Kit decided to walk with me, since she doesn’t live too far away from me and said she wanted to talk to me about something.

Of course, wanting to talk and actually talking are two different things. We were already halfway from the school when she actually spoke up.

“Your sister… she’s a pretty good fighter ain’t she?” she said.

“Yeah,” I answered. “She’s the Slayer after all.”

I think I’m not going to explain the whole “Slayer” concept to you right now. Suffice to say, my sister Buffy, while not really helping when it comes to my social status, tends to save the world a lot.

“Right,” said Kit. “But you’re not.”

“No,” I said.

“But you didn’t freak either.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“With the zombies. You didn’t freak.”

“Yes I did. I was scared stiff.”

Looking back on it, that was a really bad pun. Good thing it was unintentional. Better thing that it went unnoticed.

“Yeah, you were scared, but you didn’t paralyse like I did.”

“I’ve had some experience,” I said. Experience mainly gained by being kidnapped time and time again, but I wasn’t going to tell her that.

She chuckled. “Yeah, right.”

“You’ll get used to it,” I said.

“Was that supposed to be encouraging?”

“Err… yeah,” I said.

“So when you found out about it all, were you freaked?”

“Found out about what?”

“You know… zombies and vampires and slayers and whatnot.”

I had to think about it. The remember the moment I found out about it all. But it’s a false memory. I remember taking it all in stride. I just shrugged and said “Oh.” Something to that extent. Really, I’ve known about all the horrible stuff all my life. Literally.

But what if I hadn’t? What if my life was happy and vampire-less until the moment I found out it wasn’t vampire-less. Would I still take it in stride?

“Yeah, I was freaked.”

“That always happens,” said Kit. “When the world suddenly turns out the way you didn’t think it was, people freak.”

“That’s true,” I said, wondering where she was heading with all this.

“And it doesn’t have to be something major, like the vampire thing. People can freak when they discover one of their best friends is gay and sort of in love with them.”

“I wouldn’t freak about something like that,” I said confidently.

“Really?” she asked.

“Really,” I said. God, I can be thick sometimes.

Kit stepped in front of me, stopping me dead in my tracks. She looked at me pretty intensely.

“Sure?”

Then I was freaked.

It’s now something like ten o’ clock at night. I’m no longer freaked out about Kit. I’m freaked about Buffy.

She walked in on me and Kit smooching on the couch.

The scene that followed wasn’t pretty. Let’s just say Buffy was pretty freaked about it.