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Author's Chapter Notes:
I'm not a native speaker, please be gentle ;)
At first he thought he was hearing a sound left over from his dream. He had been dreaming about Buffy and although he couldn’t reconstruct every single detail, he knew that in his dream their lips had met briefly, soft and wet, leaving a thread of spittle connecting them when they drew apart.
She had whispered his name, over and over again.

When he began to wake up, he struggled against consciousness, tried to hold on to sleep and prevent the fantasy from fading, but then he realized that someone was really calling his name.

“William… help me.”

He squinted into the impenetrable shadows, saw nothing, cocked his head, and listened intently.

“Please help me.”

He stood up and winced as he suddenly saw her appearing, her presence betrayed only by the silent rustling of her dress.
Her lips parted to a silent “William”, and she smiled sadly.

He wanted to ask her so many questions, he had waited so long to see her again, but when he most desperately needed to talk to her, he was speechless.
“Buffy…,” he finally managed to say, realizing that her eyes were looking dull.

“Help me…” Her pale face, bathed in the softening glow of the moonlight, had an expression he couldn’t stand and he stretched out a hand to touch her.

“Please…,” she whispered.

“Where are you, Buffy? Where can I find you?”

His eyes widened in shock as he realized that she was about to disappear again.
“I’ll do anything… I swear I’ll do my best to help you… I’ll find you, Buffy!,” he shouted.
He knew that he could keep the first two promises. The third, however, was something less meaningful than wishful thinking.

She faded and his outstreched hands felt nothing but cold air.
“Buffy…Summers…” the last word slipped from her pale lips almost as thin as a piece of silk.

And then she was gone.

He could smell the scent of her hair and he stood perfectly still, fearing that any movement he made would cause the memory to fade as well, leaving him with only the sour smell of his night sweat.

*****


Buffy Summers.

He had spend more than five hours to find out where she might live and now he stared at the monitor. The dropping sensation in the stomach, the tightening in the chest, the lightheadedness familiar from the sudden speedy plunge of a roller coaster afflicted him now, as he sat dead still on the chair.
Buffy Summers, Sunnydale, California.

A phone number.

With shaking fingers he began to dial the number.

And then he heard a sleepy voice saying “hello?”

He dropped the receiver and tried to stand up, but unable to break away from whatever force was keeping him there, he stared at the telephone.

The voice belonged to a man.


*******


The afternoon became a slow dream sequence for Spike, no bridge between each scene- just snapshots of Buffy and an unknown man’s shape.
He woke with a vague feeling of concern and uneasiness, thinking of the telephone call a few hours ago.
He didn’t know what exactly he had expected when he had dialled the number, but for some strange reasons he hadn’t been prepared for a guy on the phone.

Who was he?

Maybe her father, he thought.
Or a brother.

There was another possibility, but he repressed the thought of a husband as soon as it came to his mind.

And he knew that there was just one way to find the answers to all of his questions.

********


1630, Revello Drive.

Buffy Summers, his “invisible” friend, had been living less than two hours away from him- maybe for ages- and he hadn’t known.
He sighed- a long, exhausted sigh as if the journey of his life had finally led him to a place of rest.

He didn’t know his eyes were closed until someone touched his shoulder, asking him if he was okay, and he opened them.
An elderly man looked at him with an expression on his face that was more suspiciousness than concern.
“I’m fine, thanks”, he answered, doing his best to keep his voice as blithe as he wanted it to sound.

He forced himself to walk towards the house, taking in deep breaths that didn’t fortify him.
God, he didn’t have the slightest idea what to say… or what to do.
Now that he was standing in front of the door, he could ease some of the stiffness in his hands, rubbing them together, stretching his fingers, curling his fists.
The cool wind began to seep down his neck, drying his sweat.

With shaking fingers he rang the doorbell while hundreds of thoughts shot through his head, making him feel dizzy and confused.
It felt like a million of years had passed until the door was finally opened by a tall young man.

“Yes?,” he asked, furrowing his brow.

Spike cleared his throat, but not a single tone left his lips.
“Can I help you?” The guy spoke with soft, drawn-out syllables that reminded Spike of the way one would talk to a stupid child.
“Is… Buffy at home,?” he heard himself say, realizing the flare in the other’s eyes as he spoke the name.

“Buffy? May I ask who you are?” The undertone in his voice became suddenly harsh.

“I’m a friend of her’s. I’m William and…”

“William?” He spoke the name as if it was something bitter and poisouness he needed to spit out.
For a moment Spike was sure that the guy was about to knee him in the guts. His grey eyes were like a placid night sea, but below the unremarkable surface were great teeming depths full of anger.
“She never talked about anyone called William… as far as I can remember.”
“We haven’t seen each other for ages”, Spike explained, trying hard to calm down as he felt an unexplainable urge to grab him by the scruff of the neck.

“Whatever. I don’t want to be rude, but to be honest, I’ve got a lot stuff to do.”


Spike took a deep breath, clenching his fists, but said nothing.
“Well, my wife’s not at home right now, but I`ll tell her that you’ve been here.”

He slammed the door before Spike was able to react, before he could even face the fact that he had emphasized the two words that caused a suddenly arising feeling of pain in him:
My wife.

Unable to move, or to breathe, he stared at the door, trying desperately to stay calm.
The ground seemed to resolve, he felt wide, rising.

All the years filled with wondering, and the anguish of not knowing if she was real or just a fragment of a child’s imagination, momentarily disappeared.
Now he knew that she really existed.

But she was married.

None of this made sense, like a picture blurred and off-kilter.

And he felt as if someone had written the end of the story before he’d even found the beginning.





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