The Body

Well, time to start recapping this episode. Yep, all set to go. But, um, my cat just hopped up to me -- she looks like she needs some attention. Perhaps I'll just get her favorite toy and play with her for a little while. Can't be neglecting the cat, you know.

Okay, I'm back. All ready to start recapping. But it seems like I might have left a dirty mug in the sink. It's not too dirty -- I just used it for tea. But my roommate might be home soon and I wouldn't want to inconvenience her. I'll just pop into the kitchen and clean that up.

'Kay, that's done. Can't think why I'm having so many problems getting started on this recap. Except maybe because this episode, while artfully done, was incredibly affecting and sad. I'm not really looking forward to sitting through it again, let alone having to pause, rewind, pause, rewind on every single scene. I think I have some bills to pay and perhaps a little German homework to finish. I mean, I really can't be falling behind on my studies. Especially since we're covering the economic ramifications of reunification. You can't let that kind of stuff get away from you or it's just all over.

Procrastination time is over. I've now steeled myself to begin.

The beginning of the episode is the same as the last few moments of "I Was Made To Love You." Buffy enters the house and sees that Joyce has gotten flowers from a man she recently dated. Buffy smiles at the card enclosed with the flowers and calls for her mother. She enters the living room and sees her mother lying on the sofa with her eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling. "Mom? Mom? Mommy?"

Credits. The happiest, most carefree part of tonight's episode. Maybe I'll rewind and watch them a few times. Sigh.

We come back from commercial to all the Scoobies enjoying a Christmas dinner at the Summers's home. The dining room is decorated with candles and swags of greenery containing tiny lights. As Joyce and Buffy clear plates from the table, Xander makes an inappropriate joke about barfing from overeating, which Joyce chooses to take as a compliment. Giles takes his plate out to the kitchen, leaving Xander, Anya, Willow, Tara, and Dawn still sitting at the table. Queasy lookin' Willow complains she had "too much [egg] nog," and Tara, holding her hand, sympathizes, "Aw, baby, want me to rub your tummy? She likes it when I, uh -- stop explaining things." Tara then asks Dawn if she wrote a letter to Santa, but Dawn teenages that of course she doesn't believe in Jolly Saint Nick. "That's a myth," chimes in Anya. Dawn is pleased, thinking Anya is backing her up, but Anya clarifies, "It's a myth that it's a myth. There is a Santa Claus." But this being Sunnydale, the Santa Claus Anya is referring to is actually a demon with reindeer who comes down chimneys to "disembowel children." Cheery.

Buffy clears some more plates, and we follow her into the kitchen. Joyce laments having burned a pie, and Giles offers to open another bottle of wine. Buffy quips that she just wants them to "stay away from the band candy," causing Giles to cough and leave the room. "You are a demon child," teases Joyce. They share a sweet moment, and as Buffy accidentally dumps the pie on the kitchen floor, we cut to the present. Close-up of Joyce's pale, pale face. Buffy runs to the couch and shakes her mother, repeating, "Mom. Mom. Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!" in increasingly panicked tones. Is it allergy season? Because I seem to have a little something in my eye. Could be cat dander, I suppose. Let me just make sure to pull the box of tissues a little closer. The shaking having provided no results, Buffy leaps up and runs into the kitchen for the phone. She pants desperately as she dials 911 and manages to stutter to the operator, "It's my mom. She's not breathing!" As Buffy gives her address to the operator, she walks back into the living room. The operator says she's sent an ambulance and Buffy, still panting and holding back tears, demands, "What should I do?" The operator suggests CPR; Buffy sobs that she's forgotten it, but as the 911 operator starts to give her instructions, Buffy seems to recall. "I can do this," she tells herself, and puts down the phone so she can pull Joyce flatter on the couch. She tilts her mother's head back, breathes into her mouth, and begins chest compressions. Suddenly there's a snapping noise and Buffy, alarmed, stops doing CPR. She grabs the phone again and tells the operator, who assures her she "might have cracked a rib" and that it's not important. "She's cold," Buffy tells her in a confused childish voice, and there's a terribly painful and ominous pause on the other end of the phone. Um, sniff -- playing with the cat earlier must really have kicked up some dust in here, because my eyes sure seems to be watering. Maybe I should vacuum? "The body's cold?" asks the operator, but Buffy corrects her, "No! My mom." She wants to know if she should warm Joyce up, but the operator tells her just to wait for the paramedics. Buffy stands and looks out the front window. We can hear traffic pass by, and the operator still talking indistinctly on the other end of the line. Buffy raises the phone to her ear and calmly tells the operator she has to make another call. She hangs up the phone, and we get an extreme close-up of the keypad. Pause. Then Buffy dials a number and when Giles answers, she says, "Giles. You have to come. She's at the house." She hangs up and lowers the phone, staring vacantly at nothing. She opens the front door, and we can hear the ambulance siren drawing nearer and then pulling up in front of the house. Buffy walks back into the living room, leaving the front door open. She notices that Joyce's skirt has been pulled up over her thighs, and gets a panicky look. Looking over her shoulder to make sure the paramedics haven't come inside, she pulls Joyce's skirt back down.

As Buffy looks on, hugging the phone to her chest, the paramedics enter the house and lay Joyce out on the living room floor. One of the paramedics decides to intubate Joyce, and the other affixes a heart monitor to her chest. As Buffy tries to explain that her mother has been fine since her operation, the paramedics perform CPR. Buffy stares at them. Suddenly, Joyce coughs and closes her eyes. Buffy and I both can't believe it! I'm happy, but it's hard to believe -- she looked so dead. "We've never brought one back this far gone," says one of the paramedics. The ambulance rushes to the hospital. Joyce sits up in a hospital bed with Dawn to her and Buffy standing beside her. "Good as new," proclaims a doctor. Wait! This is all happening too fast. Oh, god, it can't be true. And it isn't.

We cut quickly back to the living room, where the paramedics are still performing CPR. Buffy blinks and notices the flat line on the heart monitor. The paramedics decide there's nothing more to do, and one of them calls the time of death. As they stand and gather their equipment, Buffy sinks into a chair. One of the paramedics confirms that Joyce is dead, and that there was nothing Buffy could have done; she died long before Buffy found her. Buffy stares up at him, her eyes liquid with tears, and we see only the lower half of his face as he tells her it might have been a complication of the brain tumor and that her mother felt "very little pain." He's going to call the coroner's office to come for Joyce, and that Buffy should "sit, have a glass of water and try not to disturb the body." "I'm very sorry for your loss," he finishes, and they race off on another call. "Good luck," Buffy blankly tells the empty front door. We hear the ambulance drive away, and then we follow Buffy through the living room, where she finally puts down the phone, and into a back room. Wind chimes tinkle softly in a sunny window as Buffy suddenly drops to her knees and vomits on the carpet. She then painfully stands and walks into the kitchen to open the back door. We see her, all sweaty and ill-looking, staring into the back yard. We can hear faint noises of children playing and someone practicing arpeggios on a trumpet. Leaving the back door open, Buffy blindly fumbles a bunch of paper towels off the roll and heads back to clean up her mess. The wind chimes continue their tinkling. She kneels down and places the towels over her vomit. There's a rushing noise on the soundtrack as we watch the sickening yellow liquid soak through the towel. "Buffy!" It's Giles in the front door. "Is, is it Glory?" he asks. In response, Buffy monotones, "I'm waiting. The coroner's coming." Giles doesn't understand as Buffy mumbles about getting Dawn from school. He then spots Joyce on the living room floor and rushes to her side. "We're not supposed to move the body!" shouts Buffy, and the desperation and fear in her voice make her mother's death all too real for her. Buffy raises her hand to her mouth in horror. Giles wraps her in a hug as she stares at her mother's body.

Commercials. It's too wrenching to see vapid Playstation and Pizza Hut ads after such an affecting piece of television. I wish they could have aired this episode without commercials.

Somebody zips Joyce into a black body bag. As the zipper noise continues, we cut to Dawn, crying. This seems strange. How did Buffy tell her already? Dawn sobs, "Oh God. I can't believe it," but a girl off-screen tells her, "It's not that bad." Huh? Oooh, I see. Another "not what you think" moment. Dawn is in the bathroom at school, crying because "Kevin Berman call[ed] [her] a freak in front of everyone." As Dawn's friend washes her hands, they discuss whether being called "freaky" is better than being called "a freak." Apparently someone named Kirsty has been blabbing to the school about Dawn's cutting herself in "Blood Ties." Dawn defends herself, saying that the cutting was an accident, and then fantasizes about making Kirsty's head explode using the powers of her mind. Because appearances are everything in school, Dawn worries that others will know she's been crying and wipes her eyes.

The bell rings and they head off to class, passing Kirsty in the hall. Dawn and Kirsty exchange utterly polite, utterly insincere greetings. Dawn and her friend then enter an art class and take their places at their easels as the teacher lectures about negative space. The name-calling Kevin, a floppy haired youth, has his easel set up to Dawn's. He and Dawn share some talk about the assignment, and in the background Dawn's friend holds up her drawing pad, scrawled with the words, "He wants you!" Dawn wiggles in embarrassment. Kevin asks about her cutting incident, and as Dawn tries to defend herself, he commiserates, "I felt like that before. Things get so crazed, you know. You feel like you just want to do something extreme." I love seeing Dawnie at school, but Lord spare me the philosophical mumblings of little boys. He's obviously an alien. As Dawn and Kevin bond by bagging on the evil Kirsty, we see Buffy pass by the glass windows of the room and then approach the teacher. The room is very, very quiet as Buffy says, "Dawn. I have to talk to you." Shot of someone drawing on paper. Shot of the teacher looking stunned. Shot of Dawn's friend. Shot of the statue the class is drawing. Dawn inquires if it can wait, but Buffy asks her to come with her. They go outside into the hall and Dawn demands, "Tell me what's going on." Buffy wants to tell her outside, but Dawn refuses to go. Go outside, Dawn! Buffy says the news is bad, and we can see that everyone in the art class is staring at the tableau in the hall. "Mom had an accident. Or um, something went wrong from the tumor," explains Buffy. Starting to cry, Dawn protests that Joyce must be okay. Then we're inside the art room. We can see Buffy and Dawn but can't hear them. Buffy explains, and Dawn's face crumples. She shakes her head and begins to sob. I really wish Buffy would hug her about now. Dawn backs away from Buffy and collapses to the floor, sobbing, "No, no, no, no, no." Kevin and the art teacher look sad but don't suggest maybe giving the Summerses some privacy. Instead they continue to stare at them as if they're some sort of exhibit in a museum of grief. Finally, the camera pans over to Dawn's drawing. ["And speaking as a former junior-high art teacher -- all the drawing in this class looked way too good to be true." -- Ace]

Shit. Another extremely jarring commercial. At least it gives me a chance to breathe, though. I was holding my breath all through that last scene. Sniff.

Joyce's body is lying on a morgue table. Gloved hands remove her sweater and begin to cut off her camisole.

Have you ever tried to type a recap on your laptop while your cat insists on sitting in your lap and rubbing her head on your fingers as you type? It's very difficult, but oddly reassuring during such a sad episode. We cut to Tara, looking very sad. The camera pauses a long while on her face, and then we see she's watching Willow, who looks disheveled and like she's been crying. Willow is holding a shirt and staring at it vacantly.

Absolutely silent shot of Anya and Xander driving. The sound slowly comes up as Xander pulls up in front of Willow's dorm. We get an aerial shot of the car and pan back through the window of Willow's room.

"I think they're here," says Tara. Willow is still holding the same shirt. She throws it onto a pile of discarded clothes on the bed. In the car, Xander asks if Anya wants to come up to Willow's room, and she quietly tells him he's double-parked. He doesn't care, and they get out of the car. Now, for the first time in the history of this show, someone seems to be putting actual thought into one of their outfits. Willow is desperately asking Tara if a purple shirt is appropriate. She dithers that it's too depressing. She holds up a yellow T-shirt, declaring it "cheerier," but then worries that it would be rude to wear a cheery shirt. She looks through the closet and wrings her hands about a blue shirt she wants to wear that Joyce once complimented. I can really relate to this scene. To my dad's funeral, I wore mismatched shoes and ankle-zip, acid-wash jeans. Shudder. Let me repeat that. I wore acid-washed denim to my father's funeral.Yes, I was grief-stricken. Yes, it was 1988. Yes, I was thirteen. But still. But still. Recapping this episode is obviously some sort of karmic payback. It also goes to show you just how out of it my mom was that she let me out of the house wearing it. This was the woman who, when I turned twelve, decided that I should start wearing a bra. Never mind that at that point I was a 26 negative triple A cup in that my chest was still concave; she would still stop me before I went out, feeling up my shoulder and asking with her German accent, "Are you vearing zee praw-pear undervear?" In front of my friends. In front of my friends that were boys. Oh. Sorry. I got carried away there. This scene is about Willow's pain, not mine. Anyway. After having confirmed that the blue shirt isn't in Tara's room, Willow returns to worrying about the purple one. She's got a dark dribble down the front of her tank top from a tear or her nose running. Wow, Aly, that's method acting. Tara, hoping to reassure Willow, suggests that the purple is royal, which actually causes Willow to break into more tears. "Buffy needs me to be supportive," she whimpers. Grabbing up a pink sweater from the bed, she rants, "God! Why do all of my shirts have to have stupid things on them? Why can't I just dress like grown-up?" Tara comes to Willow and shushes her, placing her hands on her shoulders and kissing her forehead. "Tara," sobs Willow in a ragged voice, and suddenly the girls are sharing a natural, completely unadvertised kiss. Aw, sweet. And perhaps even a tiny sizzle of chemistry. Sure, it's only on the level of a few lightning bugs in a baby-food jar, but it's a start. They stand with their foreheads together and Tara assures Willow, "We can do this." Willow tries to pull herself together but starts sobbing again at the thought of "little Dawn." Tara tells Willow to be strong, and Willow replies, "Strong like an Amazon." Tara smiles in assent, but Willow is back to wishing she had her blue shirt.

Xander and Anya climb the stairs up to Willow's dorm room with Anya asking doubtfully, "So what do we do?" Xander monotones that he isn't sure. As they enter the hallway, Anya again asks, "Xander, what will we do? What will we be expected to do?" Xander can't answer that with anything but a stare. They come upon Willow's door ajar, and I don't think that, if my best friend's mom died, I'd leave my door cracked so all the sorority bitches could get a glimpse into my theatre of pain, but whatever. They enter, and Xander and Willow immediately gravitate towards hugging range. Tara and Anya stand around looking uncomfortable. Willow mentions that she's afraid of crying again and Anya, trying to make conversation, reveals that Xander indulged in the salt-eye over at the Non-basement of Non-debasement. She pronounces it "weird." Willow, slightly acidic, says, "It's a thing that we do," and Anya gives everyone such a hang-dog look that my heart goes out to her. The gang stands around looking uncomfortable until Anya breaks the silence by asking what's going to happen. Willow says that they're meeting the gang at the morgue. Then Willow gives Tara a pained look and goes off to change again. Xander desperately looks for someone to blame for this, settling first on Glory and then on "the doctors." Willow comes back to hear his tirade against the medical profession. Willow tells Xander that "it just happened," and Xander looks to the rest of the gang with a "Do you believe this crap?" look as he spits, "Things don't happen. Somebody'sI mean somebody's got" Willow gives a little shake of her head and then raises her fists, offering to duke it out with him: "C'mon. You and me." Xander's look softens, and he takes Willow's head between his hands and gives her a long, tender kiss on the forehead. "You know I can't take you," says he. "Damn straight," agrees Willow. See! This is the kind of Xander/Willow friend-type interaction I've been missing, and then they give it to me like this? Damn Joss and his monkey paw!

Anya breaks in with, "Are we going to see the body?" Willow reacts with a full-body "What?" and Tara deflects the attention from Anya by reminding everyone that they should take over patrolling for the foreseeable future. Willow again decides that her sweater is inadequate, and Tara offers to go check the laundry room. Anya walks over to the dresser and asks if they're going to perform an autopsy on Joyce. Only she unknowingly says it in the most literal and offensive way possible. Willow finally loses her cool and begs Anya, "Just stop talking. Shut your mouth. Please." Anya doesn't understand what she's doing wrong, and earnestly asks Willow if she should be changing her clothes, if that's "the helpful thing to do?" ActuallyI didn't really like that ruffled blouse last week, and that was before I saw it with that upholstery-patterned skirt. Xander tries to interject, but Willow runs right over him to read Anya the riot act, yelling that "it's not okay for [her] to be asking these things." Anya gives an impassioned speech about how she doesn't know how to react. She wraps it up with, "And Xander's crying and not talking and I was having fruit punch and I thought, 'Well Joyce will never have any more fruit punch. Ever. And she'll never have eggs or yawn or brush her hair. Not ever.' And no one. Will explain to me. WHY?" As her voice cracks on the last syllable, she covers her face with her hands and cries in earnest. Wow. Who knew Emma had it in her? I might have to redefine my views on all former stars of . Could it be that not all of them are talentless hacks after all? Ush. I'm not really ready to think about that right now. There are very few beliefs I'm secure in, and the fact that was a crap-ass show filled with crap-ass acting is certainly one of them.

Willow looks chastened, and Xander comes over to comfort Anya, but she pushes him off and sits in Willow's papasan chair. Willow brokenly tells her, "We don't know. How it works. Why," and goes to sit on her queen-sized bed in her single dorm room that is the size of some small European countries. Seriously. You could fit Liechtenstein in the corner over there and still have room for most of Luxembourg. Xander paces a lot; everyone else sits in silence. Anya pulls a Kogepan doll (also known as reason number 872 of why I love the Japanese) and Willow's blue sweater out from under her. She clutches the doll and stuffs Willow's sweater in a drawer. There's a loud retort from Xander's fist crashing through the wall. The girls jump up to find his hand stuck in the wall. Xander apologizes. Tara returns as Willow and Anya try to free Xander's fist from his drywall prison. Anya explains to Tara that "Xander decided that he blames the wall." Xander pulls his fist free, and Xander and Anya go over to play doctor (literally) by the sink. Willow mentions that they need to hit the road, and in the background Xander agrees while Willow, without fanfare, silently mouths "I love you" at Tara. And THANK GOD that they finally seem to be treating their relationship with the subtlety it deserves. With the way things have been going this season, I had worried that Willow would someday say to Tara, "You know, I love you [turning to the camera] because I am GAY! You heard me, world! I dive the muff. I'm GAY GAY GAY GAY GAY!" Everyone files out, and a second later the door opens and Willow grabs her cardigan off the nightstand. After she leaves, the camera pans over the window sill to show Xander's double-parked car getting a ticket.

Back from commercial, we are treated to an overhead shot of Joyce's vacant stare as, post-autopsy, Dr. Doom 'n' Gloom pulls a sheet up over her and switches off his spotlight. I would've thought that, for an autopsy to determine if Joyce had an aneurysm, they might have to actually cut into a good part of the head, but then I remember that they removed her entire tumor through a single pore. The doctor makes his way out of the autopsy area and down a very dimly lit hallway (that's violating numerous Cal/OSHA standards, what with all the crap piled around) and finally into the waiting area.

Cut to Buffy and Dawn greeting the Scoobies. Hugs all around, including Anya launching herself at Giles who, after being taken aback for a moment, folds her into a reassuring embrace. Giles catches sight of Dr. Doom 'n' Gloom and makes his way to him along with the remaining Summers girls. The doctor quickly fills them in, saying that "the on-site report seems more or less accurate." He reassures them that Joyce's death was very sudden and painless. At his words "even if someone had been by her side," Buffy quickly flashes back to a could-have-been universe. Three quick-cut scenes: Buffy catching her mother as she falls to the sofa, then a shot of Joyce in the ambulance gazing adoringly at Buffy, and finally one of Joyce in her hospital bed with Buffy by her side and Dawn curled to her, suffused with the glow of fluorescent lighting. "it's doubtful that this would have been dealt with in time." Buffy stares at him blankly and asks if he's sure that Joyce died painlessly. The doctor replies, "Absolutely," and while his lips form completely different words, we hear what Buffy hears, which is, "I have to lie to make you feel better." Giles brings the discussion back on track and offers to take care of any required forms.