1.
The diner makes all the waitresses buy their own uniform, and since they are ridiculously expensive and no one who is waitressing for a living has that kind of money straight up, it ends up coming out of Anne's paycheck a little every week.
As she's packing the few things she has before she catches a bus back to Sunnydale, she looks at the white colored dress and thinks she should probably take it back to the diner. It won't be paid off for another two weeks.
She takes off the nametag and leaves it hanging in the closet instead.
2.
She's in Sunnydale's only formal shop, looking for the perfect dress to be crowned Homecoming Queen (because she's going to beat Cordy even if she has to die trying), when she sees the long green sheath. It's got a great sweetheart neckline and she thinks it might even make her eyes look more green than grey.
Just as she's reaching for it she remembers that green is Scott's favorite color and snatches her hand back, the pain of getting dumped, even by a guy she didn't really like, still too fresh. She picks a red dress instead, and doesn't stop for a moment to remember whose favorite color that is.
Really.
3.
Buffy's almost packed for her trip to visit Faith in Cleveland when it occurs to her that she should take something a little dressy, just in case they go out. And she's a girl, so of course nothing she already owns will do at all, so she grabs her purse and goes shopping.
She's in the third store, browsing through the clearance racks and trying to find something that isn't pastel and covered in flowers when she looks up and sees it on the display. It's halter-style black leather with a skirt two inches longer than trashy and totally out of her price-range. A vision of dancing with Faith, pressed hip to hip as Faith's hands smooth over leather-encased curves, flashes through her mind and it's real enough that her breath catches in her throat.
Too real. She buys the pink sundress instead, spends the money she saves on a little hotel room and when Faith invites her to go dancing she says she's tired.
4.
Gunn asks her to marry him and she says yes. And she means it when she says it because hello, he's perfect and she loves him and hello. But the months pass by and there are always good excuses for not setting a date, not firming up plans, until one day Dawn and Willow push her into the car and take her dress shopping.
The perfect dress is white, strapless, with a poufy skirt and a bit of a train. Buffy looks gorgeous and she thinks for once she might be able to top Gunn in the looks department, even Gunn in a tux. Still, she leaves empty handed and heavy hearted.
He says it's o.k., he understands. Buffy doesn't, not really.
5.
The final time she dies she doesn't think about her mom or her sister, her friends or her lovers. She doesn't think about destiny or the laying down of burdens.
What she thinks about is that damn ugly dress they buried her in last time, and inanely, wishes she'd followed through on her promise to herself that she'd have something burial-appropriate yet pretty in her closet before she died again.
The End