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Usually Willow would be annoyed. Every time Spike told Buffy anything of importance, the blonde would ask the redhead for verification. It was always ‘Are we really Bronzing tonight?’ or ‘Did Riley really do this?’ and it was really beginning to grate on the computer nerds nerves. However, this time, Willow could understand why Buffy was reluctant to believe Spike – She would have been too, the news was so dire.

Spike had been out the week before and had spotted Buffy’s boyfriend of four months ‘snogging’ a brunette who went unnamed because Spike was too busy getting into Parker’s face and asking him what the hell he was doing, making the brunette troll of a teenager cower in his polished shoes. The bleached-blonde had been unable to tell Buffy what had happened until the first day of school as she had been on a trip with Joyce and Dawn to New York for the last two weeks of the summer holiday. He hadn’t wasted anymore time on pulling her away from Xander and Willow, knowing that this wasn’t information that one pussy-footed around telling a person, especially Buffy, as the longer you waited, the worse the reaction would become. He knew that she wouldn’t believe him, but he had expected an explosion rather than the quiet simmering of anger and denial beneath the surface of her hazel eyes that he actually received in response to his declaration of Parker’s unfaithfulness.

“You’re lying,” Buffy said in the quietest, yet most menacing, tone of voice anyone who knew her had ever heard her use, including her little sister who was subject to constant threats. Spike, however, was unfazed and just shook his head and looked at her, every one of his facial features saying how sorry he was that he had to be the bearer of such horrible news.

“Why would I lie about something like this?” Spike knew exactly how untrusting Buffy was of men, especially him because of the incident of the previous summer, and he really didn’t need Buffy questioning him any more than she already did. He always told the truth, hoping that one day she’d finally realise that he’d never actually lied to her in the entire time that the two had known each other. Of course, Buffy never had, and she was adamant that Spike was out to hurt her like the summer before. It had never once occurred to her that him calling her father had been exactly what she had needed.

“Because you live to torture and hurt me maybe?” Buffy always clung to the fact that she and Spike had been each other’s nemesis before they had formed a friendship, just so that she could have an excuse to mistrust him. She would never admit that it was the worst excuse in the book, as the sparring that had gone on was never meant to severely hurt the other’s feelings, and was instead just a playful taunting to relieve the boredom that was school.

“You know I’d never lie about something so major.” Spike scowled as his mouth opened and continued to work without consulting his brain first. “In fact, you know I’d never lie to you at all. Every time that you’ve questioned Willow on something I’ve said, she’s verified it. I don’t understand why you bloody well insist on thinking I’m deceiving you every bloody time we speak, and to be perfectly honest, it’s beginning to get on my ruddy nerves and all.” Buffy simply looked at him like he was a complete and utter moron.

“You want to know why I don’t trust you?” Buffy took a step forwards, raking her eyes over his form with a look of disgust (which wasn’t due to his clothing choice of leather duster, black jeans and t-shirt, a red shirt and heavy Doc Martins, as she had often defended his fashion sense) before looking back to his face. “Fine, I’ll tell you, Spike. I don’t trust you because you snuck around my house when my mother, my sister and I were busy, got my dads phone number – which, by the way, was tucked at the bottom of my underwear drawer - called him and invited him round. O, and you did all this without consulting one single other soul about it. And I would be completely not surprised if you didn’t think at all about how I would feel about you inviting my father around, whether it did me good or not. And, for that matter, how my mother and sister would feel about my father being there uninvited and all. That is why I don’t trust you, Spike.” Spike shook his head and stepped forwards towards her, getting even closer.

“But I never once lied to you. Not once. I simply didn’t tell you. And you just admitted that it did you good!” Spike sighed and looked at Buffy imploringly, willing her to listen to him. “I swear to you, Buffy, I’m telling you the truth. I wouldn’t lie to you about this. I know how much it’d hurt you feelings. You’re going to feel like you’ve been betrayed by yet another guy and-“ Buffy held a hand up to stop Spike, angry fire in her eyes.

“You know nothing about how I feel, Spike.” Buffy spat his name with so much venom that Spike almost flinched but he managed to stand his ground. In fact, he stepped even closer to her, black leather duster swaying around his ankles as he got right up into her face.

“Bull. I know you, Buffy Summers. Better than anyone else. I could finish your sentences if I bloody well wanted to. I could read your mind and know exactly which food you’re craving.” Buffy swallowed a little. These were both true. Even before they were friends, when they were still ‘mortal enemies’, he’d been able to finish her sentence, finish her insults. And when they became friends, and she would call him feeling down (about something other than her father), he would often randomly come out with ‘Bet you’re craving strawberries right now’ or ‘Bet you want some Phish Food right about now’, and it would always be exactly what she did want. Spike had only moved to Sunnydale 4 years before her dad had left, and yet he knew her better than Willow or Xander did, and they had been her best friends since kindergarten. “Don’t tell me that I don’t know how you feel. I got you to cry last summer. Not willow, not Xander. And hell, you might have forgiven them for calling your father. But no. You got stuck with having to deal with the implications of me instead.”

Buffy knew that he was right; she would have forgiven Willow or Xander for calling her father. Spike… he made her want to be angry with him just because he existed. However, just because he was right, didn’t mean that she was going to give up the fight. But neither did this stubbornness and refusal to give up her side of the argument meant that she wasn’t beginning to feel more than a little uncomfortable with the close proximity of his face and her lack of personal space, so she stepped back one space, a move that was responded to with a raised eyebrow from Spike. Buffy simply glared back at him.

“Just because you knew that I needed to cry, and what would make me cry, does not mean that you know how I was feeling, Spike. I could have been angry, sad, jealous, any number of feelings." Spike’s retaliation was instantaneous.

“You felt betrayed, Buffy. Betrayed, lonely and unloved. You had always been Hank’s favourite, and when he suddenly didn’t care anymore, you thought that it was your fault.” Buffy went to bite her lip, but she thought better of it at the last moment. Any outward sign of him having had effected her would be her downfall. The trouble was, Spike was scarily accurate in his interpretation, and the petite blonde didn’t like it one bit. Course, she knew that he had known why she had been so upset, and it had always concerned her, which was why she kept her distance. She didn’t like the thought of any man understanding her (other than Xander, but Xander didn’t understand anyone, so that was never going to happen anyway), and Spike understanding her was the worst thing that could have happened. However, now that he had said it out loud, there was no escaping him, or it. Didn’t mean that she wasn’t going to try though.

“You don’t know anything, Spike, and I don’t need to listen to this.” Buffy started to turn away, but Spike grabbed her arm in a tight hold and swung her back round to face him. He was finally in the mood for a confrontation and he was going to have it, whether Buffy wanted one or not.

“Yes, you do. Everyone’s fed up of your attitude, Buffy. I’m fed up with the fact that you won’t, not can’t, won’t trust me, even though what I did was good for you. Everyone else is fed up of telling you things that I’ve already told you, because if you would just trust me, they needn’t waste their breath." Spike took a deep, shaky breath before sighing and looking down at the floor. He was going to have this out, even if it completely ruined their already precarious friendship. He looked back up into Buffy’s slightly startled face, loosening his tight grip on her arm a little bit. “I’m fed up of not being able to hug you in the mornings when I see you, like I used to, just because you don’t want to be touched. I’m fed up of not having our chats on the phone when you feel like crap. I’m fed up of not coming to your house after school on a Thursday to drink hot chocolate with those mini marshmallows in it while you blabber on about some cute guy or really annoying girl.” It went unspoken that this was usually Cordelia Chase, head cheerleader. “I’m fed up of watching that wanker, Parker, use and abuse you while he’s shagging some other bird behind your back, because you could do so much better than that arse. I’m fed up of caring for someone who refuses to give me the time of day anymore.” Spike swallowed as he lifted his left hand and ran his fingers through her shoulder length blonde hair, hand shaking a little as he watched it, finally saying, in a quiet, reflective tone, “Why can’t you forgive me for caring, Buffy?”

When Spike looked back at her face, all he could see in her eyes was fear and surprise, and it hurt. Of course, he understood the surprise as everyone had always assumed that his feelings stopped at friendship, but from his declaration it was going to be glaringly obvious that it went a lot deeper than that.

What happened next, though, was something that nobody had expected, not even Spike, no matter how well he knew her. Buffy’s eyes began to water, and as she blinked them away, she lifted her hands and pushed against Spike’s chest, catching him by surprise and making him release his hold on her arm, before she turned and fled in the opposite direction, as if all the hounds of hell were on her heels. Spike watched her disappear, still a little startled, before he shook his head to clear it, growled and turned, storming off in the opposite direction.

The usual noise that normally gave the central quad a buzz instantly returned as the small crown that had gathered in anticipation of the usual fight began to dissipate as the drama they had received instead ended, whilst Willow and Xander, who had sat on the sidelines on their usual bench (Willow sat properly while Xander perched on the back) simply looked at each other, Willow’s bottom lip red from where she had been nervously biting it – unlike Buffy – before they stood, grabbing their backpacks, Willow tucking her curly, shoulder length red hair behind her ear as she dashed off to find Buffy, with Xander heading in the opposite direction to find Spike.





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