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William shoved his head under the pillow. Maybe if he ignored the alarm clock it would disappear. Peering out from the protective embrace of his cheap motel pillow, he gave the clock a dirty look. He hated mornings, and he hated having to get up and go to work. Why couldn’t he just stay in bed all day? With a final groan, William reached over and turned off the alarm. At least now he could be grumpy without the obnoxious beeping invading his thoughts. Maybe he could go back to sleep for a few more minutes. Glancing back over at the clock, William decided that wasn’t an option, since he was already running late. He really needed to get up and start getting ready. His eyes roamed over to the bathroom. To shower or not to shower, that was the question. Something clicked in his brain. The bathroom light was on. That was odd. He didn’t remember leaving it on, he must have forgotten to turn it off after. . .

The memory of last night slammed through the fog that had been clouding his mind. He turned over onto his back, pressing his face into his hands, and let the images march their way through his consciousness. For once there was no confusion. The pictures and sounds were clear and concise. Xander's friend, Mr. Giles, him in the duster, and a rather derelict room. The combination didn't make any sense. William opened his eyes and combed his fingers through his hair. This had been nothing like the dreams. For one thing, it had happened while he was awake, not to mention that it had felt real. Disturbingly so. But, Mr. Giles had been in it. He had only met the man twice, so why would he be in it? What did it mean? Why now? Why when he was just starting a new life was this happening to him? He must be going crazy. That was the only way to explain it. Maybe the shock of the cold water, coupled with being angry with Xander, had caused him to crack. He had been kind of stressed out lately, what with the relocating to Vegas and starting a new job, so maybe everything was just negatively affecting him. Yes, that's it. No need to get freaked out. He just was stressed, and had let his imagination get the better of him. He hadn't been sleeping well, either. Maybe he hadn’t been drinking enough water. It was rather hot and dry in Las Vegas, so maybe he really did have heat stroke. That was it. The walk yesterday afternoon had caused him to have some sort of weird hallucination. More water, less sun, that was the solution.

William sat up and rubbed his eyes, happy with his new found explanation. No need to dwell on the weird vision. It was easily explained away. Best to forget all about it. All thinking about it would do was stress him out further. With that final thought, William got off the bed and started to get dressed. Working hard always made it easier to forget certain aspects of his life, especially certain weird hallucinations. Thank God they were laying brick at work today. He was going to need the hard labor. He finished getting dressed and walked over to the sink and brushed his teeth. After he finished, he put the toothbrush back in it’s holder and looked up into the mirror and stared at his reflection. Even though he told himself that he wasn’t going to think about the vision anymore, he couldn’t help it. Especially what Mr. Giles had said to him. He had tried to ignore it, but he kept on hearing the man say, "Has it occurred to you that there may be a higher purpose?" What did that mean, and what the bleeding hell was happening to him? William stared at his face, taking inventory of his features, and finally focusing on his eyes. If he stared long enough, maybe he’d be able to see into his own soul. Find answers to his questions. Find out why Mr. Giles thought he had a higher purpose, or whatever the hell he had been talking about. He reached out and ran his hand over his reflection. “Who are you, William?” he whispered. He turned around suddenly and went to the dresser. Grabbing his keys and some money for lunch, he ran out the door. Maybe if he ran fast enough he'd escape his thoughts. Too bad he couldn't leave his head behind as well. That would fix the problem for sure.

Buffy stared at the steering wheel. Now that she was in Las Vegas, about to see Spike, she couldn’t move. She was almost paralyzed as the last moments she had spent with him played over and over in her head. No matter who she had dated, or who she had slept with, nothing and no one had made her feel as loved and protected as Spike had those last few nights in Sunnydale. She had been the General, she was the one who was supposed to protect everyone, but somehow Spike could make her forget all that. For those few, brief moments she was able to forget that the world was ending and that everything was falling down around them. They were together, and for once in the many years that she had known him she was okay with that. She smiled a little as she thought of the look on his face when she had asked him to sleep with her the night the others had kicked her out. Looking back on it now, that was one of the things she missed most about him. She had been bitchy and ill tempered, but still he acted as if she were the queen of the world. Happy to oblige her smallest requests. Acting as if the small crumb she threw him was the biggest banquet in the world. It was that moment that she realized that she loved him. As he carefully lay down beside her, gathering her in his arms. Everything that he was to her, her friend, her lover, her confidant..it all hit her at once. He was her everything. And then it was over. He was gone. They had saved the world once more, but this time she had to go on without him. The only way that she could cope was to lock the memories away. After Sunnydale, she didn’t think of him often. Not because she didn’t miss him, or mourn him, but because it was too painful to remember. Leaving him in those last moments, knowing that he hadn’t believed her. That he had died thinking that he was unloved and unappreciated. If she had kept those thoughts in the forefront of her mind, she wouldn’t have made it. Even now, the feelings of loss, despair, and guilt threatened to overwhelm her. It wasn’t the healthiest way of dealing with what had happened, but then she had never been the poster child of emotional stability.

She lowered her head and rested it against the wheel. No way was this going to be easy. Not only would she have to go into Slayer-Buffy mode, just to be able to emotionally deal, or not deal as the case may be. She was going to have to do it by herself. She didn’t even know what she was dealing with. Spike with no memory? How the hell was she going to pull this one off? Sometimes her world sucked.

Buffy sat up and took a deep breath. She looked in the rearview mirror and smoothed her hair. Make-up? Check. Hair? Check. Paralyzing nerves of fear and anxiety? Check. And with that, Buffy opened the car door and went in search of Xander.

William walked quickly down the street towards work, still feeling anxious and unnerved by the vision. If sweat and manual labor didn’t help him forget about it, he didn’t know what would. It’s not like he could go to a therapist and ask for help. He still didn’t know if he was actually a good person or not. The way he had woken up in the alley still made him nervous. He could just picture the look on the good doctor’s face when he told him his story. Why yes, Doctor. I did wake up next to a dead body, covered in blood, with no record of who I am! Isn’t that just neat? Won’t it make a great case story for your next article in the Journal of Extremely Looney Patients? Great, glad that I could help. He was so caught up in his thoughts of padded walls and straight jackets that he didn’t notice the blonde woman walking near him. They both turned into the entrance at the same time. William being on the inside was knocked into the chain-link fence. He quickly grabbed the top of the fence, to keep from falling down.

“Bloody hell! Watch where you’re going!”

“Oh! I’m sorry. I was distracted and I . . .” Buffy turned to face the man, and couldn’t talk. Words were gone. They had disappeared; in fact she couldn’t remember if she knew how to speak at all.

William hauled himself up and brushed his hands on his jeans. They were all scraped up and stung a bit. Daft woman couldn’t even watch where she was going. He turned his attention on to her and gave her a look. Beautiful girl. She looked familiar though. He struggled to place her. Then he remembered, she was one of the girls in Xander’s picture. One of his lady friends with the odd names. She was staring at him. With a look on her face almost identical to the one that Xander had worn, when they first met. What was with these people?

“Um…miss? Are you okay?”

Buffy just stared, trying to speak. What should she say? What should she do? It was Spike. He still had that eyebrow arch-thing. She loved that. All she wanted to do was throw her arms around his neck and kiss him until she couldn’t breathe. She wanted to tackle him to the ground and inspect him at her leisure. She needed to know that he was real. That he wasn’t just a ghost or a figment of her imagination. She really didn’t know how to do that without tempting a restraining order, so she suppressed the urge. Getting a little control back, she decided to fall back on what she had been using for years. Flirty blonde. She could get close and innocently touch him. Yeah, right. Making the decision she stepped towards him.

“Oh I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you! Are you okay?” She reached her hand out as she “accidentally” tripped, her hand immediately coming into contact with his chest. His solid, warm chest. His arms reflexively went out and caught her to him to prevent her from falling. Okay wrong move. If she had wanted control over herself, this was the wrong way to go about it. But for a moment, she just let herself sink into him. The first thing she noticed was he smelled the same. Whoever said smell is one of the best ways to remember, were right. His smell gave her the feeling of safety and love. It was the same feeling that she would get when she would come home after school and her mom had been baking cookies. It was home. He was her home. She was such a sap.

William looked down at the woman. She was almost snuggling him, which was odd, but not entirely uncomfortable. As he was wondering how to gently remove her, she looked up at him. As their eyes met, he lost all train of thought. There was something about those eyes, he thought as they stared up at him, large and tear-filled. Something niggled at the edge of his mind. Something about this woman and tears . . .Something. . .He shook his head. No more crazy hallucinations. His brain was obviously weak and unprepared. He was susceptible to crazy ideas and dreams, and this woman was not helping matters. William gently pushed her away and helped her regain her balance.

“Well, Miss. . .” he mentally scrambled for her name. “Uh...Buffy, I need to get to work, so I guess I’ll see you later.” He was starting to feel ill at ease around this woman, so he quickly nodded his head towards her, stepped around her and jogged into the lot. She wouldn’t stop staring at him and it made him uneasy. Besides, he had work to do and hallucinations to forget. Too bad, though, she was one hell of a looker.

Buffy watched him slow to a walk and head towards the other workers. She never thought that she would hear him say her name again. How he knew it, she didn’t know. He’d probably learned it from Xander or something. She looked down at her hands to see that they were shaking. She bent down and picked up her purse, and started walking towards Xander’s trailer. She was still dazed by her sudden reunion with Spike. Definitely not how she pictured it. How was it that she could face a Hell-God, demons, and the First Evil, and not back down, but the minute she was confronted with someone that she loved she reverted into a scared, little girl? One of the world’s greatest mysteries.





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