This is the whole debate about whether or not the proprietor died. Remember? Dru and Sunshine went to the Magic Box and that's how they found out that Jenny bought the Orb of Thessala. We didn't see him die, but he probably did. So we don't know who the proprietor is when you've set it, which probably means you can do whatever you want.

eta clarity

eagainta and I'm really enjoying this, too. I've been lurking but I couldn't resist chiming in on the shopkeeper thing.

We assume he died because the following year the proprieter was a woman.

Yeah, I figure he died too but isn't there some contingent who likes to believe he's alive and living it up somewhere? He's the BBS, right?

(Boogedy Boogedy Shopkeeper)

Anyway, that debate is why I remembered the whole thing. That and the Dru deathmatch.

"Um, don't get me wrong? He's a nice guy and stuff? He just likes to pull stuff on the tourists." She sorted through his shopping basket."Oh, no, these will never work. Look, I can bend it and I'm not as strong as you. Or whatever you're fighting."

"Do I know you? I thought maybe Mrs. Pembleton..."
" No," she said. "I don't think so. It's okay, though. Nobody does."
"Well, thank you for your help."
"Oh, yeah, that's Tara. Always helpful. You know, I did have some redwood stakes that...fell off a truck that I could let you have."
"At cost, right?" Tara said. She was surprisingly canny.
"Ok, at cost."

May I submit a late drabble? you fic infectors, you.

Pictures from home for company in England. She made copies. She's not so far gone she'd cut up originals.

Sharp shears from the sewing drawer. She's surprised they let her near them.

Delicate cuts like betrayal between a red head and a blonde/brunette. Precise cuts like vivisection between a sable head and one that must have owned L'Oreal stock. Careful alignment so that the red and the sable lean against each other and smile happily at the camera, nothing between them, like nothing ever should be.

Giles, too silent, behind her. "Willow, what--"

"Just remembering. When it was just us."

I love the drabble format. My husband, who is geniusdude, made the breathtakingly simple suggestion that in novel troublespots, I ought to use the form to impose a self-discipline of shape and length on the issue I was having. It works.

Love love love drabbles. They honestly do force me to a kind of precision, not only in how I execute a story, but in how I perceive it. Beginning, middle, end and brutally finite.

What's not to love?

Connie, I like that portrait of Willow, but I have a stupid question -- is she cutting two people out of the picture (Buffy and Anya, maybe?) or just Buffy?

I thought it was Anya and Tara and Kennedy?

The upcoming is pretty silly, but I need to think through the whole apprehension thing.
It was late when the detectives returned to the squadroom. Both slightly bedraggled, Frank smelling faintly of garlic and something else nobody could identify, and Tim still looking like the walking wounded whenever he breathed deeply. "Oh, shit." Bayliss mumbled.

The rest of the squad had redecorated their work area in their absence. A rubber bat now hung on a cord above the desk chair and the phone was covered in angelhair cobwebs.Frank opened the desk drawer and was confronted with plastic fangs. "All right!" Pembleton said, "What the hell is this?"

"Just trying to make you feel at home," Munch said. "Now that you are walking on the dark side and all. The squad's too boring for Mulder and Scully."
"And Timmy is walking funny," Bolander said, with mock sadness. "I guess I owe you five bucks, John."

"I am *not* 'walking funny'. I sustained an injury. In the course of an investigation."

"Too much information," Kay Howard said.
"You're just saying that because you lost. Sour grape is not a good color on you." Munch said.

"I didn't bet on that. Tim, swear to God. I did make the cobwebs, though. You wouldn't want me to waste all my Home Ec, would you?"

BtVS/Sandman Crossover Drabble

Lux

It didn't look like a demon bar, although the girl in the Phantom of the Opera style mask wasn’t at all fazed by the sight of a green demon in a purple Armani suit. But the clientele seemed to be human, so perhaps she just assumed he was wearing prosthetics. A person could get away with a lot in La La Land.

Lorne heaved a sigh of relief. Fretting about competition was only going to give him wrinkles.

He ordered a Seabreeze, and it was perfect.

The pianist smiled at him angelically, and started to sing.

Lorne dropped his glass.