A/N: Once again there’s music serving as inspiration to my writing and I use one of the songs I’ve been listening to in this and the next chapter. The song is Michelle Branch’s “I’d Rather Be In Love” from her “The Spirit Room” CD. Song lyrics found in // //
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“Tara,” Buffy looked up from the cash register to greet her next customer and was surprised to see the familiar Wiccan standing before her.
“I thought I might catch you here,” Tara said quietly while tucking her hair behind her ear like she’d been caught doing something wrong.
“You have news?” when the other woman nodded shyly Buffy turned to her manager, “I’m taking my break now.”
The Slayer gladly took off her stupid cap and fluffed her short hair before moving from behind the counter to lead the young woman back to the table they’d sat at just yesterday.
Had that really been all the time that had passed, she wondered as they sat down, one day?
“I wasn’t expecting to hear back from you for a few days yet,” she hated that she actually felt nervous about what she was about to hear.
“There really w-w-wasn’t much to it. I just double-checked everything we did and that h-happened and,” she smiled reassuringly, “there’s nothing wrong with you.”
Ok, Buffy sighed inwardly and accepted that news. She’d been expecting to hear it.
Hadn’t she?
“Then why can Spike … hurt me?” the million dollar question was finally asked aloud.
“Well, I said that there was nothing ‘wrong’ with you, but,” Tara paused and Buffy knew she wouldn’t like this but, “you are different. Shifting you out of … f-from w-where you were, funneling your essence back into your body … i-it, it altered you on a basic molecular level. P-probably just enough to confuse the sensors or whatever in Spike’s chip. But it’s all just surfacey physical stuff. You’re still you, Buffy. The difference wouldn’t have any more effect on you than … than a bad sunburn,” she smiled with a bit of satisfaction at her conclusions.
With eyes that no longer saw anything, Buffy sat there and continued to look at the girl across the table from her.
She wasn’t in shock, she told herself. She’d known all this before Tara had … just confirmed all her fears.
Breathing … her chest started rising and falling more rapidly as she forcibly remembered she needed to breathe. She sensed the Wiccan growing tense with worry and concern across from her, knew that the girl was saying something more to her, but she couldn’t hear anything.
Her body wasn’t working right now.
Her mind was too focused on one thing for it to worry about the little things like breathing or listening or trying to slow her suddenly rapid heartbeat.
“You are different.”
“Buffy,” Tara was suddenly reaching across the table to grab her shoulders and shake her firmly.
“I didn’t come back wrong,” she said dazedly, half hoping she’d heard wrong.
“No,” Tara sat back and smiled reassuringly to try and cheer her up, “you’re the same Buffy,” her tone got a bit lighter. “With a deep tropical cellular tan.”
She shifted her stunned gaze to the table they sat at for a silent moment then whispered without looking up, “You must have missed something. Will you check again?”
“Buffy,” her tone had Buffy looking up, “I promise, there’s nothing wrong with you.”
But there has to be, she protested silently as her eyes continued to dart around looking at nothing. Has to be something wrong with her. Why else did she …
“Oh God, no,” she whispered aloud as a single word from her thoughts last night reappeared and she feared she had the answer to that unspoken question.
“Buffy, w-what’s w-wrong?”
“I have to go home,” she told the other woman before rising to go tell her boss the same thing.
“Buffy,” Tara said to announce that she had been waiting for her, “t-talk to me. W-what’s going on?”
“I,” Buffy looked at the witch then away, “I can’t talk about it. Not,” her green eyes pled for understanding as they met Tara’s, “not yet.”
“W-when you’re ready you c-can t-talk to me i-if you w-want and wh-whatever it is, I’m sure it will be ok.”
“I hope so,” she said under her breath before wrapping her arms around her waist and turning to walk home. “Tara,” she turned back for just a moment to face the other woman, “thank you.”
~*~*~
Her bedroom was dark when she awoke from the nap she’d found herself needing desperately when she arrived home and part of her wanted to call everything she remembered of her day upon waking a dream, but she still wore the uniform she’d fallen asleep in and knew it had really happened.
Rolling off the mattress she moved to pull some clean clothes from her closet and dresser then made her way to the bathroom to wash the grease from work out of her hair.
When she stepped back into the hallway in blue jeans and a black mock turtleneck a bit later she felt better physically, but her mind was still so jumbled she doubted she could tell left from right or up from down. All the showers in the world weren’t going to help her with the realizations she was coming to about herself.
Suddenly the sound of music coming from Willow’s room reached her ears and caught her attention as she recognized the song. It was one of the kind of sad, slow rock songs that her friend had been listening to a lot since her breakup with Tara, but the lyrics caught at Buffy as she listened to them, unmoving just outside the bathroom.
//I cannot help it, I couldn’t stop it if I tried//
//The same old heartbeat fills the emptiness I have inside//
//And I’ve heard that you can’t fight love, so I won’t complain//
//’Cause why would I stop the fire that keeps me going on?//
//’Cause when there’s you, I feel whole//
//And there’s no better feeling in the world//
//But without you I’m alone//
//And I’d rather be in love with you//
//Turn out the lights now//
//To see is to believe//
//I just want you near me//
//I just want you here with me//
//And I’d give up everything only for you//
//It’s the least that I could do//
//’Cause when there’s you, I feel whole//
//And there’s no better feeling in the world//
//But without you I’m alone//
//And I’d rather be in love with you//
//And I feel you holding me//
//Why are we afraid to be in love?//
//To be loved//
//I can’t explain it//
//I know it’d tough to be loved//
//And I feel you holding me//
“Buffy?”
She was so lost in thoughts brought on by the music that it took Willow repeating her name two more times for her to fully realize the redhead was there trying to talk to her.
“Are you ok?”
“I think I will be,” she said quietly, not really focusing on her friend.
“Tara called about your having a bad day at work,” Willow was looking at her with concern. “Do you wanna talk about it?”
“I can’t yet. There’s something I’ve gotta do.”
“Buffy,” the redhead reached out to stop her when she turned to go to her room and get ready to go out, “if something were wrong, you’d tell me wouldn’t you?”
“There’s nothing wrong,” and with a sudden certainty she knew that wasn’t just some empty reassurance for her friend.
It was the truth.
“There’s nothing wrong,” she smiled and gave Willow a hug. “I’ll try and explain it all when I get back.”
“You coming back tonight?”
“It’ll probably be late, so don’t wait up. We’ll talk tomorrow,” she promised then paused again before going to her room. “That song … the CD … can I borrow it?”
Her friend blinked in surprise at the request then nodded and said slowly, “Yeah, sure.”
~*~*~
No pun intended, but this place was dead tonight, Buffy thought as she walked through the cemetery with a trusty stake ready to dust vamps but she was finding none.
Guess nothing was going to let her put this off any longer. With a sigh she made her way slowly to Spike’s crypt.
She could so this, she told herself as she arrived at her destination and went to the door.
And just stood there.
He was in there probably waiting for her to show up for another tumble as he called it. That wasn’t what she was there for tonight, though, and she didn’t know how to proceed.
Usually she just stormed in like she owned the place, but she couldn’t do that this time.
She raised a hand to knock on the wood, but found she couldn’t do that either. With another sigh she leaned against the barrier between her and him and placed her hand against it, feeling suddenly like it was an insurmountable barrier.
Was she really ready to do this? Did she really even know what she was doing?
As she stood there wondering that she began to sense him on the other side of the door.
She waited breathlessly for the entrance to be whipped open by him, but it stayed closed even though she knew he was there and he knew she was there.
Was he as nervous as she was?
Her gloved hand caressed the wood between them and wished it away even as she was grateful for it’s presence.
What if she couldn’t tell him?
What if he wouldn’t listen?
What if it didn’t change anything?
Then suddenly she found her gloved hand pressed against Spike’s bare chest as he stood in the now opened doorway wearing his black jeans and an unbuttoned black shirt.
She looked up hesitantly and found his piercing blue eyes looking right back at her and knew this was it.
No more ‘what ifs.’
It was show time.
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