Part IV
“You’re still here?” Dawn asked in amazement when she came home from school, Xander coming in behind her, obviously intent on seeing if Spike were still there or not.
“Yeah, bleach boy’s still here?” He was decidedly less happy than Dawn.
“Yes,” Buffy stated as she came out of the kitchen, looking non too happy with Xander, “He’s still here. And I’ve decided you might as well chill out about it.”
“Why’s that, Buff?” Xander didn’t like being angry with Buffy, but when it came to Spike, he had trouble seeing reason.
“Because I think he just might be around a bit more.”
“Buffy, he’s evil. You know he’s just trying to work his way in…get you to trust him so that he can kill us all!”
Dawn burst out laughing, not even stopping at all when Buffy glared at her.
“Xander,” Buffy answered sweetly, “I want you to go home, get a piece of paper and write out every argument you have for why we shouldn’t trust Spike, for why he’s some evil creature intent on taking over the world. Then, I want you to pretend that you’re Dawn,” She ignored the odd look he gave her, “And write out—objectively—everything Spike has done to help us over the last few years…not why you think he did it, just what he did.”
He started to question her, but she quieted him with an upheld hand, “Just do it, okay?”
“Yeah sure. I’ll go do that now. But really, Buff, don’t trust him,” He couldn’t help but throw that in before he left.
“What?” Buffy asked several second after the door had closed when the other two occupants of the room just stared at her. “It’s not a totally insane idea,” She defended herself.
Dawn sensed their need to have this out in private. “I’m just going to go…do my homework,” She said before quickly scampering out of the room.
“Wasn’t thinking it was insane at all actually. Just wondering how…and why you came up with it.”
“Oh,” She said, “Well, actually I kind of did the same thing last night so I thought that maybe…”
“What do you mean you did the same thing?” Maybe he was pushing too much but there wasn’t any other way to find out.
“I mean, well, I had a good time last night and then when I finally went to bed…well I went into normal Denial Buffy mode and tried to convince myself I was crazy and that I needed to send you home as soon as possible…But then I started to think about things and well….I remembered that when I was little and I had to decide between things, I’d make a pro and con list, you know? So that I’d have to look at just the facts and not what I wanted to do…”
“Buffy, I don’t want you being nice to me based on some list’s facts, not if you don’t want it.”
“No! But that’s the thing, see, I think I knew all along what I wanted; I was just letting everyone else convince me that it was the wrong thing to want. But now, now it’s like I have proof….like I have something behind me saying ‘No, Buffy, you’re not insane; you’re doing the right thing’.”
“And what is it you’re right about, luv?”
“Trusting you,” She said simply.
“That all?” God, why was he pushing this?
“Well, trusting you and….just kinda liking you,” She whispered.
“Just kinda?” He joked.
Buffy pushed past him to sit on the sofa, trying her best to glare at him. “What happened to your little, ‘a crumb, Buffy, just a crumb’ thing? I’m all with the ‘I trust you Spike,’ ‘I like you Spike’ and all you have to say is ‘how much?’? That’s not very nice.”
“Sorry, luv,” he said from his same spot, not moving any closer to her, “Was being a greedy bastard. Won’t ask any more questions.”
“Not even if I wanted you to?” She asked hopefully.
“Buffy!” He said, rolling his eyes.
“Fine, don’t ask then.”
“How am I supposed to know what you want me to ask, kitten?”
“You could just ask that, ah, that last one,” She said quietly, more serious now.
“Only kinda like me?” Spike asked, moving languidly closer to her, his voice no longer unsure or teasing having taken on a more, dare she admit it, sensual edge.
“Little more than kinda,” she said seriously.
“How much more?” He pressed, hoping it was what she wanted him to do.
“Quite a bit more actually.”
“Yeah?” He asked stopping in front of her, his legs touching hers.
“Yeah.”
Buffy stood up, only mildly surprised when Spike didn’t back up at all, leaving their bodies flush against each other.
“Is this a ‘like’ that would—“ Spike started to ask, but she interrupted him.
“Uh huh,” Buffy said, hoping beyond hope that he’d been about to ask what she thought he was about to ask.
“This isn’t something you can just take back Buffy,” he warned her wanting her to see that this wasn’t something to joke around about—at least not with him.
“Not planning on it,” She informed him.
“And Harris and Red and Glinda…and Rupes?” He didn’t want to start something only to have it end, if it were going to end, he wanted it to happen now. Before he got his hopes up.
“What about them?”
“They’re not going to like this, luv. You okay with your friends not being happy with you?”
“Well, still just the tiniest bit mad at Willow—though I’m trying not to be, so she’s not a problem. And I thought you’d know by now that I don’t care what Xander thinks about it…and well I’m sure Tara will actually be fine with it. She likes you, you know? Anya too.”
“Demon girl’ll probably just ask something ‘bout orgasms.”
“Probably.”
“And what about Watcher boy? What about what he thinks?”
“Don’t care,” she said simply.
“Yeah,” he said, “You do.”
“Okay, fine,” She admitted begrudgingly, “So I do care, but…Giles is like my dad,” She attempted to explain, “And like any dad he’s not going to think anyone’s good enough for me…but I think that, especially after this past summer and everything with Glory, he knows that you really are a good man.”
“You mean that?” He was obviously dreaming because there was no way all of this would happen so quickly. Sure they’d been doing better recently, ever since Glory’d beat him up that one time, but this….God, this was more than he’d hoped for…well, almost. He always had set his hopes too high.
“Spike, you’re a good man,” She repeated.
“So,” He said, trying to downplay how much that statement had affected him, “We going to uh,” He realized he didn’t actually know what it was he was asking her, “What exactly is it we’re doing here?”
“Well, at the very least we’re trying to be friends.”
“And at most?”
“We’ll just have to see.”
TBC....Please review