Things to Know While Living in Sunnydale (An Annotated List by Dawn Summers) by Amy

1. If you live on the Hellmouth, it's a good idea to have extra clothing.

Dawn has lived in Sunnydale for seven years now, which is quite a long time, if she thinks about it. If she steps back for a second and looks at things the way they really are, the way they could have been if the monks didn't tamper with reality, she's lived in Sunnydale her whole life.

She can count on one hand the number of clothing items she actually grew out of. Even during her growth spurts, it seemed that things were more often blood-stained or covered with grainy dust that wouldn't come out, rather than tossed for being worn out or too small.

And with all the girls living here now, everyone under one roof, there's a lot of clothes-theft going on. A lot of people saying things like "Oh, I hope you won't mind if I borrow this" and then getting it covered with blue sticky stuff that Dawn doesn't even want to identify. A lot of people not remembering that if a shirt said "hand-wash only", that didn't mean tossing it into the washer with their hands.

Dawn has twice in the past year demanded- and gotten- an increase in her allowance for clothing. She needs it.

The only one of the girls at the house who lets Dawn her their stuff is Amanda, and that's because they knew each other from school.

2. Boys are bad news. Do not date boys.

Boys started being bad because Buffy said they were bad, and swore up and down that the first boy she saw her sister with was going to learn the concept of "Slayer". And then the first boy she got to kiss turned out to be evil and trying to kill her and stuff. And then you add in every other boy she'd ever dated or even had a crush on, plus the whole Spike thing, and... yeah. Dawn is totally over boys.

She's totally over men, too. No more crushing on the guys Buffy was, like, in love with, or whatever. No more staring longingly at Xander or Giles or Riley or any of the other people who walked into the Summers household. It's bad enough in a normal place, where a girl can get a crush on just about anyone and have her heart viciously broken. It's worse here, in Sunnydale, where the odds are good that the boy you love is actually the evil undead.

So Dawn has sworn off boys. Forever. Or possibly just until college. But definitely not now. If she wants to have a relationship, she fully plans to sit down Willow, Buffy, or Xander- whoever's around- and have them remind her what happened with Tara and Oz, or Angel and Riley, or Cordy and Anya. That'll be enough to turn her off from any relationship. Misery is bad enough in the Summers family without boys clouding the waters.

Besides, no boyfriends is totally not the same as no boy-space-friends. Like Andrew. Andrew is the best boy-space-friend she's ever had. Plus, he's really good at helping her with her hair, and sometimes they go through magazines and pick out hot guys together.

She's not into boys right now, but she's not made of stone. When Amanda's not around to hang out with, Andrew's a really good second choice. For her birthday, he's taking her to see Margaret Cho live. He says that every boy should bring his best girl-space-friend to that, like a rite of passage.

Dawn isn't exactly sure what a best girl-space-friend does, besides watching ice skating competitions with him and teaching him the lyrics to the latest Britney songs, but she's glad to be his.

Besides, being around Andrew all the time means most of the stupid boys from the high school will stay away from her, and leave her to hang out with people she actually wants to hang out with.

People like Amanda.

People like Faith.

3. The Bronze is the place to see and be seen.

Faith takes two or three of the Slayers in Training to the Bronze whenever she goes, to get them out of Buffy's hair probably, and sometimes when Dawn's really good Faith takes her too. Dawn always tries to be really good.

When Faith is in a bitchy mood, sometimes, Dawn getting mad and blowing up at Buffy counts as Dawn Being Really Good. So Dawn likes to see it as being paid for a job well done. That's why she uses some of her new clothing allowance to get tight skimpy sparkly things Buffy would never let her wear out in public. It's just another way to spite her sister.

Faith doesn't just let Dawn wear the skanky stuff. She insists.

"Look, don't tell your sister, but you're going with me, and how you look is going to reflect on my style. Don't make me look bad, Dawnie." But the way Faith says it, Dawn knows that she's kidding. And a second later, Faith will break into a grin. "Why don't you wear the black one that shows off your tits? -And don't tell B I said that to you. She'll kill me."

"I won't," Dawn promises. And she doesn't.

Because if she told Buffy any of the things that happen when Faith takes her out dancing, Faith would be out of the house, and Dawn would be grounded until she's, like, eighty, and there's a limit of things to do around the house, especially with people inhabiting every square inch.

Because if she couldn't go out dancing with Faith, what else would she have to look forward to?

She's not the Slayer, not the Watcher, not the anything. Just the key. She's beyond pointless. Dawn is, like, the wardrobe that the lion and the witch had to walk through. And now Glory's in Narnia, or whereever the hell she went after Giles killed Ben- Hell probably being the operative word- and she's just a stupid container for clothes.

Clothes that none of the other girls give back.

Most days, Dawn thinks her entire life revolves around clothes she used to have that she doesn't have now.

Nearly every day, in fact.

Every day that she's not out dancing with Faith.

4. People die. Cope.

Dawn's seen a lot of death in her life. Buffy's seen more, she knows, but, well, Buffy's way older than she is. Plus, it's Buffy's sacred duty. Not Dawn's. Buffy gets to be Superman, which is what everyone totally wants to be, and Dawn? Dawnie's gotten really good at screaming like a girl and running. And being held captive a lot. So far, the biggest benefit of living in Sunnydale for seven years is understanding how to work with manacles, which really won't be very useful later in life unless she decides to grow up and be an S&M freak or something.

But lately she's been realizing that, like, most people? React way more to death than Dawnie does. Like, sure, when her mom died, Dawn freaked hardcore. But who wouldn't It was her mom.

Most people, though? Sure, it's tragic. Sure, Dawn's gotten to the point that she understands the finer points of embalming and six of the people at the Sunnydale Mortuary know her by name. And of course she hates all the funerals she goes to.

But Dawn's seen the Slayers in Training absolutely freak at death. Especially when the death is one of their own. And it seems like Dawn is, like, the only one who's nonchalant about it.

Some of the girls died. So what? Lots of people die. If your absolute job in life is going to be stabbing lots of things with big sharp weapons, odds are pretty good you're going to be a target. Start preparing.

Jesus. The first time the girls saw death, Dawn had to stay up with Xander, Willow, and Buffy, trying to calm down the forces for good. If you asked Dawn (which no one did), evil wouldn't have to do much to win. They could just sneak up behind the girls and whisper boo, and they'd all trip and fall and probably put a sign around their neck for the all-you-can-eat buffet while they were at it.

Even now, it seems like the only people who get it are the ones who grew up with it. Like Faith and Buffy, who've seen it firsthand. Like Xander and Willow. Like Anya and maybe, maybe, Andrew. Like Amanda, who grew up in Sunnydale. Like Dawn.

With the space shortage of late, three or four girls sleep in Dawn's room, usually, and lately Dawn just sleeps over at Amanda's house. She doesn't have her own bed there, either, but at least it's quiet, and she doesn't need to hear Kennedy and Willow through the walls, which, sorry, but ew.

Sometimes Xander or Buffy or someone comes over to see them and make sure they're okay, but mostly, no one cares, as long as they're alive and not doing anything too stupid.

Dawn doesn't worry too much about dying, because from what she can tell, at least it'd get her some attention.

5. High school is on the Hellmouth, but it's only Hell if you think it is.

Dawn's sitting in math class and she knows that Amanda's in school, because they walked here together, but she hasn't seen her since. There's probably some Slayer Emergency Thing. Buffy's pulled Amanda out of class more times this year than she's pulled Dawn out since kindergarten.

But while they're going through the homework, she smells Amanda's shampoo, a slight trace unless you know what you're looking for, and Amanda's sliding into the seat behind her. "Hey," she whispers.

"Hey," Dawn whispers back. "Problem seventeen. Want to borrow?" She shifts her papers to reveal a photocopy of her math homework. The way friends do.

"Thanks," Amanda says, and unlike last time, they don't get caught. Which is good. This means they have a system.

Dawn does the history and the math, and Amanda does the science and the Spanish, and if you add them together they're becoming very good students. Even if each of them only knows two things.

They do the homework together, flopped down on Amanda's bed together, helping each other when a question comes up, giggling over what their math teacher was wearing and how the new kid rejected, like, the hottest guy in school. And between questions, they lean over and kiss.

Just, like, experimenting. Or at least that's how it started.

But sometimes it gets to be a little more. Sometimes hours pass and Spike calls, irritated, because they were supposed to be at Dawn's place hours ago and Buffy's been bitching for just about that long, and frankly, at this point he wants to stake himself, and that's about where they stop listening because Dawn has to find her bra but first she has something more important to do and Amanda is trying to listen to Spike and answer coherently instead of screaming and sometimes that's not an option and once Spike, Buffy, and Willow ran over because they thought the girls were being brutally killed but really, it was just a little death, or several of them, more accurately.

No one knows about what they do. The kids at school just think the freaks are becoming friends. And Amanda's violent, and Dawn's sister has some authority, so no one really tries to do anything to them.

That's why going to school isn't such a bad thing.

It's also why going home after school is better.

6. If you're PMSing, don't talk to a Slayer unless you have a death wish.

Which is a rule that Dawn really should have followed, she's guessing, given that right now she's pressed up against the wall, her arms are being held over her head, and she's wondering if that whole psychotic thing Faith went through was just a phase, or if she's really going to kill Dawn, like yesterday, and if that's the case, if there's a reason, and if her tombstone will say something like "She was there. A lot.", and if the dates on it will say she's been alive since her birth or since her creation.

"Get off," she protests. Buffy taught her basic self-defense, but that's nothing against a Slayer you just pissed off, and Dawn knows it. Faith's breath is hot on her skin and Dawn squirms and struggles but she's not exactly getting away and they both know that too.

"Not til you tell me what's going on," Faith says.

"What?"

"You're being a bitch. Not that that's new, but this time it's not to B, so I figure I deserve to know what's going on."

"Yeah, ah, newsflash. Puberty."

"Bullshit." Faith tightens her grip just a little and Dawnie isn't saying what she's thinking but her body may be, and the more she squirms the bigger Faith's smile gets, and all that Dawn can process now is that Faith's not at all like the manacles, she's softer and smoother and warmer and she could get used to this.

So when Faith asks what's eating her, she responds the way that she probably shouldn't, and she might not be thinking but then if she were she would never have done this, and her lips are hard against Faith's and Faith's grip hasn't wavered but Dawn can feel her melting into the kiss and she's vaguely aware that this is what sex feels like, and there's no arguing with the fact that Faith is a pro, if sex were a career choice, and at the very least it would probably pay better than being a Slayer, but that's not important because right now the only thing in the world that matters are Faith's lips on her own.

When she kisses Faith, nothing is slow or sensual or giggly. The world is broken up into patterns of colors and she can't really process them, except to know that they're beautiful and she likes them.

Kissing Faith is the closest thing Dawn can find to a contact high.

Faith knows how to make anything feel good, and she does it, so well that sometimes it terrifies Dawn, but the payoff is always there and always worth it. Dawn could fall in love with the way Faith's skin tastes, with the way Faith knows to flick her tongue just the right way so that Dawn nearly faints from coming so hard.

Sometimes, late at night, Dawn wonders if Amanda will get like that once she becomes the active Slayer.

But when Faith is in the room, her hands playing across Dawn's body like a musician's on a harp, Dawn doesn't even think about that.

When Faith is there, Dawn doesn't think at all.

Which is how both of them like it.

7. If a door is closed, and you live in a town with ritual sacrifices, knock first.

But by mistake, or maybe by fortune, Dawn doesn't knock, and instead of finding her math book on her bed where she left it, she sees Faith and Amanda there, wearing next to nothing and gyrating on the bed- on her bed- lips and hands connecting, legs intertwined so that with every movement one or both of them groans.

And Dawn knows she should be upset, or maybe angry, or maybe taking her book and leaving and forgetting the whole thing, but she can't do anything but watch them, like she's frozen, like her entire body is on fire and even though they don't know she's watching them she does and she should probably be blushing but all of her blood is focusing itself in one place and it's definitely not her face.

And she coughs, or she fidgets, or maybe that's just the sound of her squirming and trying not to look like she feels, but they see her and she does the only thing she can think to do, which is nothing, and wait for them.

And then Faith is at her, and Amanda is, and neither of them is wearing very much clothing at all, and they're both against her and she's wearing way too much but hell if she's going to say a word because even through the fabric of her shirt she can feel both of them, and this is an awful lot like what the health teachers say a wet dream is, but she's not a boy so it probably isn't one, it's just a fantasy, because damn, if this is real, Dawn's life just took a left turn out of teen angst and into porno.

Not that she minds.

And now she's shirtless- now she's topless- now she's damn near naked and she's kissing Amanda, she's kissing Faith, they're kissing each other, and nothing is real or everything is and she's not real but this is happening this is definitely happening and she can feel two, three, four hands all over her, and they might all be hand she knows well but when they're used together they feel different, not more or less real but an entire other entity, and they're one that Dawn could get used to.

Dawn is on the bed.

Dawn is floating.

Higher, higher, higher-

Dawn is Faith and Dawn is Amanda and Dawn is everyone is everyone else is everyone beside them, and the Slayer, the Slayer, the Slayer, the Slayer is everywhere and Dawn is there with them, even though she isn't, even though she's not real or perhaps just not real enough, they're here, they're there, they're everywhere, and she is with them and she is everything they are and she is nothing and if this is the end of the world that they're facing, at least it's with a bang and not with a whimper.

Because of Rule 8.

8. Death can come at any moment. But until it does? Enjoy the ride.

And with three of them, entwined on Dawn's bed, hands on mouths on skin on life?

Dawn does.

.End