She winced -- in sympathy, perhaps, as she watched him swallow. Her cheeks were dry, now. Her eyes only a very slight reddish colour. The threat of crying, not the end result.

"You know," Buffy took the pill bottle away once he was done. She closed it for him. "I don't know what I would've done if..."

The girl's bullet hadn't have missed.

"If you didn't deign to teach me the sea-faring ways. I'd feel so left out."