When Sam landed in front of her, she almost jumped back to make space. But she didn't want to. And when they were standing there, not moving, she did want to move. Forward. There was a pull she had to fight. He was tall, cute, sweet, and God, those arms... Deep breath, Buffy.
While they'd spent so much time in the car together, that car was pretty huge. So they hadn't been very close. With the windows down and music on, it had seem pretty impersonal. But close to him, face to face - that was a horse of a different color.
She was almost certain that Sam felt the same thing. Or something like it. Because he lingered in front of her longer than was needed. If she had reached her hand out it could have easily hit upon his. Would he flinch backwards or would it feel like a charge of electricity?
But he moved away, and she felt her shoulders droop downwards, towards the tiled floor. She also exhaled, as though she'd been holding her breath. "Sure, yea," she practically coughed out as a reply - although she wasn't even sure what he had said until she played catch-up by repeating the fragments in her head. "Food is good," was her brilliant sentence. Dying of embarrassment she closed the door to the bathroom.
There was a towel that looked clean. She'd be changing into these clothes again, which was fine. There was a tall, marbled glass type of stall where you couldn't take baths. Inside the shower, the water was able to get surprisingly hot. No matter where you are, a hot shower always feels good. As she soaped up her thighs and the side of her hips she found herself thinking of thoughts she hadn't given a lot of time to for a while. Like, what would Sam think of her body if he could touch her there, and there?
Losing herself in those pleasant, secret thoughts she tilted her head under the shower head to let her hair absorb water and turn a darker shade of blonde.
Unaware of anything else in the room with her eyes closed, a dark black smoke was drifting in from a vent near the door. The black smoke was working its way through the room. It parted into two separate sections. One worked its way against the opening of the shower stall, winding into the cracks and making a braided seam, knotting itself together. If anyone tried to open that door, they'd have a hell of a time.
Once that binding was secure, the other black smoke (unaffected by the water - unlike real smoke) wound itself around Buffy's ankle. It wasn't for a moment later when she knew it was there and let out a shriek of surprise. She could feel it now because it had pressed itself into her left calf, looking like a black tattoo of barbed wire. She stomped her foot, kicking at the door in panic. It didn't budge, and her leg was killing her. She felt something twisting tighter into her wet flesh. "Sam!"