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Warning: High Angst Alert!!!
Reunions / Part 33

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Buffy looked at Spikes face, his eyes were closed. She had hoped that when she told him she loved him, that it would make him happy, or at least make him smile. But all she saw was the pain that was clearly written across his face. She knew she was responsible for that pain. Both the pain of that year and the pain of just having to relive it, just so Buffy could tell him her side of their story. Seeing his pain she felt her courage slipping away. She had just told him that she didn’t ever want to hurt him again, and here she was doing it. But she had just told him that she loved him and he still didn’t believe it. She had to continue, she had to convince him that she’d meant what she’d said, that she loved him.

Spikes arms were limp, no longer wrapped around Buffy. Half laying next to him, half draped across him, left arm bent, elbow on the bed propping her up, her left hand resting on his lower ribs, right arm resting lightly across his stomach with her right hand on his left breast, she bent her head and kissed him over his heart. She could feel the dampness on her lips from her previous tears, both of their tears. Raising her head so that she could see his face again, she started talking once more.

“When you came back to Sunnydale, when I found you in the school basement, it surprised me. Dawn was in trouble and I was looking for her, and I found you instead. At first, the shock of seeing you, I didn’t know what to say. Then when you started talking, you were out of your head, it scared me. I didn’t know what to do, all my defenses jumped out in front of me. The last time we’d seen each other was ……. was before you left. I had to go, to find Dawn. I had to leave you, I didn’t know what else to do. ….. Then you showed up at my house the next week, acting all normal, sorta anyway, and I didn’t know what to make of you. There you were acting like nothing had happened, like you were just stopping by to offer a helping hand. I got angry. I mean, no sorry’s or forgive me’s, no nothings. You just tell me you’ve changed and I don’t know what to make of you. …… When you got into the fight with Anya, and the things you said, I thought you’d been playing with me.”

Buffy had been speaking in a calm quiet voice with just a touch of irritation at the end, but as she continued a note of awe slipped into her voice. “But, at the church, when you told me you’d got a soul. God Spike, I didn’t know what to think. You tell me you got it for me, your acting all crazy, and then you just draped yourself across that cross. You were burning yourself up, asking me if you could rest now. I ……. I think you would have let yourself die on that cross if I hadn’t pulled you off of it. But I didn’t know what to do next. I didn’t know how to deal with crazy you. I didn’t know how to deal with normal you. But soulful you, scared me senseless. You telling me you got your soul for me. Spike, what you said, it scared me.”

Buffy had been watching Spikes face the entire time she had been talking. Some of the pain seemed to have left his face, his brow had smoothed out a bit, but he still hadn’t opened his eyes. Taking a breath she started talking again. “I’m sorry I left you in the church. I should have taken you somewhere, back to the school I guess. But, being in the basement of the school, right on top of the Hellmouth didn’t seem like such a good place. I didn’t know what to do, so I left you there. I did come back the next day, to see if you were alright, but you were gone by then. I went back to the school to look for you, but when I found you, you were talking to a wall. I don’t think you even knew I was there. The next time I came down to see you, you were in even worse shape. When I tried to talk to you it seemed to make things worse. When you asked me to stay with you, to help you be quiet, I couldn’t do it. Seeing you like that hurt me, and it seemed that my being there was hurting you too. Every day I thought about you down there, worried about you, but I still didn’t know what to do. You hadn’t acted normal since the night you came to the house. Every time I saw you, you were acting crazier. You needed to get out of that basement. It hadn’t even occurred to me that you didn’t have anywhere else to go. Once you told me, that’s when I took you to Xanders. I thought about taking you to my place, I really did, but I was still afraid. I was afraid because you were all crazy. But I was also afraid that if I took you there you’d think it meant more than I wanted it to mean. Because I didn’t want it to mean anything. I mean, I don’t know what I mean. But I was afraid that if I let it mean anything, more than just wanting to help you, that I would hurt you again. I was really afraid of that Spike, that I was going to hurt you again.”

As Buffy lay there talking to Spike she studied his face. Eight years had gone by since the last time she had been this close to him. More than nine years since she’d had the chance to really look at him like this. She remembered one night in his crypt, when they had fallen asleep after sex, how she had woke up before him and had studied his face. She remembered thinking then, as she was thinking now, how beautiful he was when he slept, how innocent he looked, almost like an angel.

Still wishing he would open his eyes, still wishing he would wrap his arms around her again, Buffy started her story again. “Taking you to Xanders seemed like a good idea, you seemed to be getting better. Whenever I asked Xander about you, he said you were doing fine. But when I was told you were biting people again, that you were turning them, I panicked. I rushed over to Xanders and he told me you were out, that you went out every night. I didn’t want to believe it, that you were killing again. With the chip, I didn’t know how you could hurt anyone. But what if it wasn’t working? What if you didn’t really have a soul. I mean you’d told me you had a soul, but how was I suppose to know if you really did have one. When I confronted you on it, when I told you that I’d followed you and saw you with a girl, you told me it was crazy. That there was no way that you could be killing people, that you would know if you were drinking human blood. I wanted to believe you Spike, I really did want to believe you. Because if you were killing people again, that meant that I would have to stop you, that I would have to ki ……… stop you, and I didn‘t want to have to do that Spike.”

“But I had to find out the truth, so I was checking up on you. Willow did a computer search and found out that a bunch of people were missing. A guy at a club told me that he knew you, that you came in all the time, and left with a different woman every night. That’s when you called me and told me where to meet you, that you thought that maybe you had been doing something, but couldn’t remember. When we went down into that basement I was afraid of what I‘d fine, but I wanted to believe you. When those vampires came out of the ground and you turned on me, I don’t think I was ever more afraid than at that moment. I knew you were going to kill me and there wasn’t anyway I could stop you. But you didn’t. I saw you change right in front of me, I saw you stop yourself from hurting me. That gave me the chance to kill the other vampires, and when I turned to you, you expected me to kill you. You wanted me to kill you. But I’d seen it Spike, I saw your soul in your eyes when you stopped yourself from hurting me. I saw the pain you felt when you realized what you had done. Even back at the house, after you had attacked Andrew. You wanted me to kill you then too, but I could see your remorse. You were being controlled, what you were doing wasn’t your fault, but you still felt the pain for what you’d done. I saw your soul Spike, I believed in you.”

When Buffy spoke these last words Spikes eyes opened. He looked up at her, his eyes, they seemed filled with pain. He raised both of his hands to her shoulders and gently pushed her up from him so that he could move himself out from beneath her. Once he was clear of her he let her go and rolled away from her and rose to his feet. Buffy had to scramble around and was now kneeling in the middle of his bed while Spike backed up from her until his back touched the wall behind him. He could see the look of surprise on her face and the look of hurt in her eyes. “I can’t listen to this again, I’m sorry” Spike gasped out in a barely heard whisper.

The shock Buffy felt when Spike got up and moved away from her was only magnified by his words. Her voice shaking with confusion and pain, she said “Spike, I don’t understand? What did I say?”

Spikes face reflected the pain he was feeling, when he started speaking the bitter taste of gall was on his lips. “So, you could see my soul could you. I didn’t hurt you, so it must have been my soul that made me stop, was it? God Slayer, you’re as blind now as you were then. You always thought everything was because of my soul. You’ve never once thought it could have just been me, did you? When I stopped myself from hurting you in that basement, it had to be my soul didn’t it? It couldn’t have been me that stopped me, could it?” Spike continued, his voice edged with the bitter pain. “You said you saw the pain in my eyes when I realized what I had done, that you saw my remorse? It doesn’t take a soul to feel pain or remorse. It doesn’t even take a soul to feel guilt or shame.”

Buffy was shocked by what Spike had just said to her. She didn’t understand, her mind was spinning, all confused. Then she remembered something. “Spike please” she said quickly, her voice was shaking, “I don’t understand. You said something like that when you were talking to Dawn and I didn’t understand it then either. Please Spike, tell me what you mean. Make me understand. Please!” By the time she got the words out tears were already running down her face.

Spike looked down at Buffy and he could see the hurt and confusion in her eyes. God, seeing her in pain like this tore his heart to shreds. He let himself drop down to his knees, but kept the distance between them. Thinking about what he needed to say made him feel sick. In a voice thick with emotion he started talking, “You never understood Buffy, ever. For you everything was black or white. Vampire with a soul was good. Vampire without a soul was an evil monster. How many times did you say that to me. That I was a soulless monster, that I couldn’t feel, that I couldn’t love. I know it’s because of Angel you think that way, but I’m not like Angel, I never was. You think that because I didn’t have a soul I couldn’t feel real feelings, that I couldn’t feel real love. You told me that over and over again. You beat me into the ground telling me that, but you were wrong.”

Buffy was on her knees in the middle of the bed, her hands were clutched together at her mouth, tears were running from her eyes. Spike wanted to reach out and wipe them away, to wipe the pain away, instead he rested his hands on his thighs as he bent his head. Still looking down at the floor he started speaking again. “That night I came to you, …… before I left. You know I didn’t go there wanting to hurt you. I wanted to tell you that I was sorry, for hurting you. I tried to tell you, but you refused to listen. I was desperate. I was crazy. I …….. It doesn’t matter what I was. ……… I hurt you. I tried to ra…….” Spikes voice broke and he had to pause for several moments as he sucked in deep breaths of air.

“Am I sorry that I went there that night? A thousand times a thousand times I’ve wished that night had never happened. But all the wishes in the world can’t change what happened that night. You said you saw my remorse in my eyes, down in the basement of that house when I realized that I’d been killing people again. Do you remember what was in my eyes that night when I realized what I had just tried to do to you? Or were you so full of hate that you couldn’t see anything but a monster in front of you? You think I wasn’t filled with remorse and guilt that night? You think I went to the other side of the world to get a soul for the bloody hell of it? I fought and nearly died to get a soul, just so that I could crawl back to you and tell you that I was sorry. I knew that the only way you would ever believe me, would even listen to me, was if I had a soul. But you know what? After I got myself a soul I realized that all the sorry’s in the world wouldn’t change what had happened. That no matter what, I’d hurt you and nothing could ever make that right again.”

Lifting his head Spike looked at Buffy. The pain that had brought tears to her eyes was gone now, replaced by a look of confusion. “That’s right Slayer, the soulless monster Spike, who couldn’t feel real feelings, was so eaten up with guilt and remorse he went out and got himself a soul.”

“But, but I did see it Spike” Buffy stammered out. “I did see it, down in that basement I saw you stop yourself from killing me. I saw the pain and remorse on your face and in your eyes when you realized what you’d done. I saw your soul.”

“Yeah, maybe you did Slayer” Spike replied as he stared at her. “Maybe you did see my soul, I don’t know. But that doesn’t mean it was my soul that stopped me from hurting you. The bloody things not like an off/on switch, you don’t flip it and everything changes. What made me stop was me, not the soul. That thing the First was doing to me, it was shutting off my brain so that I couldn’t think. It was shutting off everything about me that makes me who I am, all that was left was the demon inside me. But when I smelled your blood, when I tasted it, it was me that ripped itself free. It was me that came back and stopped me from hurting you. The soul was just along for the ride.”

“But, Angel” Buffy stammered.

“I’m not Angel, Slayer. I never was like him.” Spike said angrily. “Angels soul was a curse. It tormented him day and night. Every wicked deed he’d ever done was dragged up before his eyes and he had to relive it and the pain of his victims. The only relief he got was when he was trying to be a good boy and make amends. When he lost his soul, the torment went away and the demon came back out to play. When he got his soul back he had to be a good boy again. But that’s not how it worked with me. I knew there wasn’t anyway to make up for what I’d done. You can’t say your sorry and make over a hundred years of bloody slaughter go away. All the remorse in the world doesn’t change a damned thing. Yes, I was sorry! Yes, I felt remorse and guilt and shame! But that didn’t change what had happened. My soul wasn’t trying to punish me, it was trying to help me. It let me see things clearer, it was like a, a teaching aid. But it didn’t control me. It didn’t stop me from doing bad or make me do good. That was me, making choices. Yeah, I admit that having a soul made it easier. But only because it made it easier to see the difference between the good and the bad. But it didn’t make the choices for me, I had to do that myself.”

Buffys hands had dropped limply to her lap, her eyes were scrunched up as if she were trying to force them to see something at a distance, her brow was furrowed in concentration. “But ….. if what ….. why didn’t you ever tell me …… any of this?” She asked in a hushed voice.

“What was I suppose to tell you? That my soul didn’t make a puppet out of me. That I had free choice. Bloody hell Slayer, I was bonkers half the time. I couldn’t tell the difference between my soul and what the First was doing to me most of the time. Even I didn’t understand, how was I suppose to explain it to you? The soul made me feel guilt, sorrow and remorse, then I had to deal with it. The First took those same feelings and twisted them all around inside my head. I was seeing bloody apparitions all the time. They were talking to me, beating me down, driving me round the bend. Time was all wonky on me, I don’t even know how I got from Africa back to Sunnydale. I don’t know if I was down in that basement a week or a month before you found me. When I stopped myself from hurting you, I didn’t know it was me stopping me. When you told me you saw my soul, that it must have been my soul that stopped me from hurting you, I didn’t know the difference. But I found out the truth of it when the First took me off to that hell pit and was torturing me. Because ya see, the First didn’t drag up all the people I’d murdered to torment me with, it made itself look like me, and Drusilla, and when it really wanted to torture me it looked like you.”

“The First had one of those Turok-Han pound on me for all the physical pain, but it was seeing you, telling me that I was worthless and that you would never forgive me, that you would always hate me, that you would never come for me, that was the real torture. Do you know why it was torture? Because the soul in me wanted to believe what the First was saying, that you did hate me and that you wouldn’t come for me, that you would never forgive me. But the me inside of me wouldn’t let go of the hope. It refused to let me give up. You’d told me that you believed in me. I refused to betray your trust. I refused to give up hope. I, me, myself, not the bloody soul.”

Buffy knelt there on the bed, she still felt confused by what Spike had just told her. But she knew that he believed what he had just told her, she just didn’t understand how it could be true. She had seen the disbelief in his eyes when she had rescued him, as if he were afraid she wasn’t real, that it was another trick of the First. When he had realized that she was real and had come for him, she saw his emotions clearly on his face, she‘d thought it was his soul shining out for her to see. She had seen the pain he had felt whenever he was reminded in some way of his past and the things he had done. She remembered how gentle, almost fragile, he was at times. How sometimes if she just touched him, or got to close to him, he would move away from her as if her touch or nearness hurt him. She remembered how he was there, for her, when everyone else turn away from her. She remembered clearly how she had learned to trust him again, and to love him in a way she had never thought possible to love anyone.

“Spike, I hear what your telling me” Buffy said, her voice shaking with emotion. “I just don’t understand it. If it wasn’t your soul that I saw in you? If it wasn’t your soul that made you change and become a good man? What was it?”

“Five minutes in hell, Buffy” Spike said, his voice a raspy whisper she could barely hear. Spike cleared his throat and turning his face away spoke louder, his voice still choked with emotion. “Five minutes in hell is what changed me. Reliving the last five minutes I spent with you, over and over and over. Reliving inside my head every second of how I hurt you. How I tried to prove that I ….. loved you.” Spike seemed to choke on the words as he spoke them. “Seeing the ‘hate’ and the ‘fear’ in your eyes. Knowing that I could never make amends for what I tried to do. Hating myself, wanting to die, knowing that dying was to easy a punishment. Thinking that if I had a soul it could punish me for eternity. Going through the pain and torture of the trials to get a soul, because the physical pain was ‘nothing’ compared to what I felt inside. Beating the demon inside me down, making it howl it’s pain and quake in fear. Letting the small piece of human still inside me come to the surface and grow. Five minutes of hell, that’s what made me change.”

When Spike heard Buffy sobbing he looked over at her and saw that she was bent over with her arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her head was bent and tears were running down her face and dripping onto the bed. He heard her whispering to herself between sobs as she cried. “I’m so ….. sorry ……. I’m …. sorry ….. sorry…..”

Spike moved over to her quickly on his knees and pulled her up to take her into his arms. He held her to him tightly with one arm while he gently held her head against his shoulder. He cradled the back of her head, stroking his finger through her hair. He made little sounds that weren’t even words to try to sooth her. Buffy’s face was turned into his neck and he could feel her hot tears running off her cheek onto his neck, burning their way straight to his heart. His own voice so thick with emotion he could barely speak he told her “Please …. please don’t be sorry. Please Buffy …… don’t be sorry for something I did. I hurt you. It was my fault. I’m the one who’s to blame. I’m the one who’s sorry. But it’s not enough to be sorry. I don’t blame you for hating me. Please Buffy ….. don’t blame yourself for this too.”

Buffy had let go of holding herself and had let her arms slip around Spikes waist as he held her. When she heard him say ‘that he didn’t blame her for hating him’ she took control of herself and forced herself to stop crying. She started leaning back from him and Spike thinking she wanted to move away from him let his arms drop away from her. But Buffy kept her arms wrapped around him and only leaned back far enough so that she could see his face. Her voice was thick with emotion when she told him. “Spike, I don’t blame you for anything, I don’t hate you for anything. I love you!”

Buffy was looking up at Spikes face as she held on to him. When she said the words ‘I love you’ she saw him squeeze his eyes shut tight as tears started to run from them, as if he were trying to hold them inside. When he shook his head and said “No, you don’t”, it took the breath right out of her. Her arms dropped limply to her side and she fell back to sitting on her heels. “Why do you ……. keep saying that?” Buffy asked as she panted for air. “Why won’t ……. you believe me?” When Spike didn’t respond, she asked, “Is it because of Angel? I heard you tell Dawn that I couldn’t love you because I still love Angel. But that’s not true! I do love Angel, but it’s the same way I love Giles or Xander or Willow. He’s in my heart Spike. I’ll always love him, but not the way I love you. I don’t love anyone else the way I love you!”

When Spike didn’t open his eyes or respond in anyway, Buffy wasn’t sure what to say next, but she knew she had to keep talking. “Maybe your right. Maybe I didn’t see your soul. Maybe I just thought I did, because I know I saw something. Maybe it was just the real you and I was just seeing it for the first time. I don’t know. But does it really matter? I know that when I got you back from the First my heart almost broke when I saw how badly you’d been hurt. I know that as soon as you were able to stand up, you were there for me. I know that without your help I couldn’t have trained the potentials. I know that when I had a choice of having the chip taken out of your head or replaced, I knew what I did was right. Because I trusted you Spike. I knew you could be a good man!”

“When Giles found out about the chip, he wanted me to send you away, make you leave. I couldn’t do that Spike. I needed you with me, I needed your strength. When I rushed to Robins place when he tried to kill you, I didn’t go there to save him from you, I went there to save you from him. You know that when things get bad I try to push people away, try to seal myself off from everyone, so that I can do what I have to do, no matter what. Giles kept telling me that I needed to be strong, I needed to be able to make the hard decisions, that I couldn’t let my emotions get in the way of what had to be done. He wanted me to make you go away. He said you were a liability, a danger to me and everyone else. But I knew that wasn’t true Spike. You were the strongest warrior I had, I needed you for the fight that I knew was coming. But more than that, I needed you for the strength you gave to me, just by being there.”

“When Caleb came to town and I led the girls to that vineyard. I didn’t know what we were walking into, but I knew it was the right thing to do. But Caleb was so much stronger than I thought possible. He was stronger than the ubervamps. He took me out with one punch, and the rest of us, we were nothing to him. He killed those two girls for fun, and Xander, what he did to Xander. But you saved him Spike. It was you who saved Xander, and the rest of us too.”

When Buffy stopped speaking, Spike could hear her trying to draw breath into her lungs. He opened his eyes and could see that she had her arms wrapped around herself tightly again. Her eyes were closed, but tears ran from them in a constant stream down her face. When she started speaking again he could hear the pain she was feeling, but also the fear that had risen to the surface of her thoughts. Her voice was raspy and tear choked.

“Caleb was so strong, it was like fighting Glory again. I was blaming myself for what had happened to the girls and to Xander. I walked the streets all night thinking about facing him again. I was afraid of him Spike! I was terrified of him! He came after me again, that next day at the school, and he took me out with one hit, again. When I woke up it was hours later and I couldn’t figure out why I was still alive. He’d had me helpless, unconscious, why didn’t he kill me? When I got back to the house, I found out that Giles had sent you away, on a mission.” Buffy made a choking sound, then opened her eyes to look at Spike kneeling in front of her. “I asked him why he’d sent the one person that I trusted to guard my back away? I got my answer later that night.”

“I couldn’t get it out of my head, why was I still alive? Caleb had made a big thing about the school and the seal, how important they were, before he knocked me out. It came to me that the reason I was still alive was because Caleb wanted us to waste our time guarding the school and the seal, but they weren’t really important. Somehow I knew that it was the vineyard that was important. That whatever Caleb and the First were trying to hide from us was there. When I told everyone what I had figured out, that we were going to have to go back to the vineyard again, they refused. I could understand that they were afraid, I was afraid too. But it wasn’t just fear that made them refuse, they didn’t trust me anymore. All those girls and Robin, they didn’t know me, I could understand them having doubts. Even Faith, I could understand. But when Willow, Giles and Xander turned on me I couldn’t believe it. I told them that I couldn’t stay there and let them throw everything away. That’s when Dawn told me that I had to leave.” Buffy bent over holding herself, trying to draw air into her lungs to breath. “Dawn didn’t trust me anymore Spike. She told me that she loved me, but I had to leave.”

Spike couldn’t stand to see Buffy doing this to herself anymore. He moved over to her and pulled her up into his arms again. Holding her tightly against himself, he spoke gruffly into her ear. “Stop this Buffy! Stop doing this to yourself! It’s over, it’s done, it’s in the past, you don’t have to relive it again!”

Buffy pushed herself back from Spike, but had both of her fist gripped in his t-shirt. She looked up into his face, tears still running down her face. “Yes I do! I have to tell you everything! I have to make you understand!” Buffy leaned into Spike again with her forehead pressed against his chest. She held like that for over a minute, taking in deep breaths until she had herself under control. When she leaned back again, her face was still wet, but she had stopped crying. When she started speaking, her voice was still full of emotion, but it was stronger, more under control.

“When you found me the next night, I’d been laying in that bed all day. I’d been thinking about what had happened, about my friends, about Dawn, about them not trusting me anymore. I was blaming myself of course, just like I always do. By the time you found me I’d given up. I had myself convinced that they were right and I was wrong. That I couldn’t be trusted anymore. But you found me and you told me that I was right, that whatever the First was trying to hide from us was at the vineyard. I didn’t really think that it mattered if I was right or not at that point. But then you told me that you still trusted me, that you still believed in me. Spike, I can’t even put into words how much that meant to me, that you still believed in me. When you held me that night, for the first time that I could ever remember, I felt safe. You gave me your strength that night. You gave me back my courage to go on. It was you believing in me that made it possible for me to face Caleb and take the scythe away from him and the First.”

Buffy took a deep breath and held it for long seconds before letting it out slowly. She continued to stare into Spikes eyes as she built up the courage to continue. “You know I’m the worst person in the world when it comes to dealing with my own feelings. I don’t know how to let them out, to share them with someone else. When we met up again that next evening I was all tied up inside. I wanted thank you, to tell you how grateful I was for what you had done for me, given to me. But I couldn’t get the words out. I almost let you walk out the door without telling you. But I couldn’t let it end like that. I told you that it was the strength you gave me that made it possible for me to go on. I didn’t know how you felt about the night before and I didn’t know how to tell you how I felt. When you told me that it terrified you, that it was the best night of your life, I didn’t know what to say. I tried to tell you that it was just as important to me, but I didn’t have the words. When you asked me if I had been there with you, I told you that I was. But then you asked me what that meant and I didn’t have the words again.” A tear ran down Buffys face as she looked into Spikes eyes. “Spike, I swear to you that I wasn’t flipping off what you had said to me. I remember what you told Dawn, how much it hurt you that I had just flipped you off. But I swear that isn’t what I intended to do. I just didn’t know how to say what it meant to me. But I swear Spike, that as important as that night was to you, it was just as important to me.”

Spike had been watching and listening to Buffy closely as she told him what she had thought and felt that night. He had been kneeling in front of her with his hands at each of her shoulders. When the single tear ran down from her eye, he gently brought his hand to her face and wiped the tear away with his thumb as he cupped the side of her face in his hand. A small tentative smile came to his lips.

“Later that night” Buffy continued, “after Caleb killed the Guardian and Angel stepped in and stopped him from killing me.” Spike started to move his hand away from Buffys face, but her hand came up quickly, catching his hand and holding it in place. “I kissed Angel. I know you saw me kiss him and I know you told Dawn that it was at that moment that you knew that I would never love you because I still loved Angel. But that isn’t what happened, not for me. I don’t know how to explain this, ….. but it was sort’a like in a fairy tale. The hero saves the girl and she kisses him, but it wasn’t really like that either. I’d been so scared for so long and having Angel pop out of no where, it was like being flooded with all these old feelings all at once and I just kissed him.” Buffy paused and looked directly into Spikes eyes. “Please believe me Spike, it wasn’t what you thought. When I kissed Angel I don’t know what I thought I was going to feel, but what I felt wasn’t what you think. It was almost like when I’d kissed him when I met him after coming back to life. I didn’t really feel anything. I was happy to see him. I was grateful to him for having just stopped Caleb from killing me. I felt love for him, but it wasn’t ‘I love you’ love. It was more like ‘Xander’ love. Then Caleb jumped up and knocked Angel out and I had to kill him again, and I never really got the chance to think about it.”

“Then Angel gave me the amulet and told me that it had to be worn by someone with a soul that was stronger than human, a champion. He told me that I couldn’t wear it and that he was there to wear it and be at my side. But I told him no, that he had to leave, in case I didn’t win he’d have to be there to form a second front against the First. That’s when he asked me about you. He could smell you on me. I told him that you had a soul now and you were different. He asked if I was in love with you? I don’t know why I couldn’t tell him the truth, maybe because I didn’t want to hurt him. Instead, I just told him you were in my heart. He got all jealous ex-boyfriend on me and I made some stupid excuses and told him that I wasn’t ready to love anyone. I should have just left it at that, but I told him that maybe someday I would be ready.” Buffy saw in Spikes eyes that her last sentence had hurt him. “Spike, I’m sorry, I didn’t say that to hurt you. I just didn’t want to hurt Angel either.”

Buffy and Spike were both kneeling in the middle of his bed, their bodies not quite touching. He had one hand on her arm at the shoulder and the other cupping her face. Buffy had one hand fisted in his t-shirt and the other holding the hand at her face in place. She stared up into his face and tried to read his emotions in his eyes. She wanted desperately to lean into him and kiss him, but was afraid that he wouldn’t let her. Spikes lips were pressed together, not in a smile, not in a frown, not in anyway inviting. His eyes were half closed and seemed to be focused on her hairline instead of her eyes. A sigh of breath slipped out as Buffy dropped her eyes from Spikes face to his chest. In a voice barely above a whisper, Buffy almost begged “Please hold me.” Spike went rigid for several seconds and when he started to pull his hand away from her face Buffy let her hand drop away as she felt his rejection. But instead of rejecting her he wrapped both arms around her and pulled her in tight against himself. A shudder of relief ran through Buffys entire body as she wrapped both of her arms around his waist and held on to Spike tightly. She’d turned her head as Spike pulled her close so that her head rested against his shoulder and her lips were but an inch from his neck. She knew that every time she breathed out Spike could feel the warmth of her breath. For several minutes she just held on to Spike, searching for that feeling of being ‘safe’ in his arms. Spike had bent his head slightly so that his cheek was against her forehead. When she was ready she started talking again.

“When I got home, after telling everyone that Caleb was dead, I came downstairs to you. I wanted to be with you. I wanted to tell you about the amulet. But you already knew about it because you’d seen me kissing Angel and heard him talk about it. But I didn’t know if you’d heard everything, about it being dangerous and needing to be worn by a champion. When I told you that part, I saw it in your eyes and the way you acted that you didn’t think you could wear it then. But I knew you could Spike. I knew you could wear it, because I already knew that you were my Champion. When we went to bed together that night, it was like the night before. You holding me in your arms, giving me your strength and making me feel safe. But something happened that night that you don’t know about. The Powers That Be made a little visit that night. Not in person or anything, but they gave me a dream, or maybe it would be better if I called it a memory. Remember when I told you about the time I went to see Angel and that I only stayed a short time, but I felt like something was missing? Well I found out what was missing that night. Angel had a fight with some kind of demon and got it’s blood on him, and the blood did something to Angel, it made him human.”

When Buffy said this she felt Spikes whole body react to her statement. He went rigid, he stopped breathing and a quiver seemed to travel down his arms as he held her. Buffy waited for a moment to see if Spike was going to say anything. When he didn’t, she continued. “What I’m going to tell you next isn’t intended to hurt you Spike. But I need to tell you everything so that you’ll understand how important it was to me. When Angel found out that he was human he went to the Oracles to find out if it was permanent and they told him it was and that he was no longer one of the warriors for good.” Buffy paused and took a deep breath, a shudder passed through her body. “I can’t do this Spike. I can’t tell you everything that happened because it hurts to much and telling you will only hurt you too. All that’s really important is that Angel ended up going back to the Oracles and told them that he wanted to be turned back into a vampire again. He convinced them to do what he asked, but the only way to do it was to turn time back for twenty-four hours. To make everything that happened between us never happen. He didn’t ask me Spike, he just went ahead and did it. He made a decision that affected both of us because he thought he was right. I don’t know why the Powers gave me back that memory Spike, or why they gave it back to me that night. But it made me realize something that I think I’d known for a long time but had never admitted to myself before. All those years after Angel left me I’d always carried this guilt around that it was my fault that we couldn’t be together. But it wasn’t my fault Spike, it was Angels. He made the decision to leave me, I didn’t leave him. He made the decision to turn back time and prevent himself from becoming human. He made the decision to take away from me the one thing he said that he wanted for me, a normal relationship with a normal guy, as long as he wasn‘t the normal guy. Every step along the way of our relationship over the years Angel has made decisions that affected my life and he’s always left me out of the decision making because he always thought that he was right. Every step along the way he treated me like a child and like my thoughts and feeling weren’t important. That’s when I realized that I didn’t love him anymore, that I hadn’t loved him for a long time, not the way I once did. That’s when I realized that I was truly free to love someone else. That’s what was going through my mind when I woke up in your arms. I was still trying to sort it all out when the First made it’s visit and it came to me how we could defeat it.”

Buffy paused again to see if Spike was going to say anything to her, but he remained silent. He continued to hold her tightly in his arms, and he had started breathing again, but there was no reaction to what she had just told him. With a sense of dread building up inside of her, Buffy continued talking. “The rest of the day we were all busy. I had to explain my idea to everyone to see if they would agree to try it. Then I had to talk to all the girls to give them a choice of trying it with me. But every moment that wasn’t filled with getting ready to fight the First that day was filled with me thinking about what could happen when we went down into the Hellmouth. I kept thinking about what would happen to all of us if Willow couldn’t make the spell work to share the powers of the Slayer with all the potentials and make them Slayers too. Because I knew that if she couldn’t do it we were all going to die. I thought about the amulet a lot that day too. All I really knew about it was that it was dangerous. Angel had said that it could make whoever wore it stronger, but I didn’t know what that meant. I kept thinking about you wearing it and it made me afraid. I kept worrying about what it might do to you. I kept thinking that maybe I shouldn’t let you wear it. That I shouldn’t let you risk yourself. But then I kept thinking the amulet might make the difference in whether or not we won the battle or not and I couldn’t take the chance of not using it. I spent that whole day getting ready to fight the First’s demon army and worrying about what might happen. But that night when I came back down to the basement to be with you, I stopped worrying. When I laid down on that bed with you, I felt safe again.”

Buffy loosened her hold on Spike and leaned back just enough so that she could see Spikes face while she continued to talk to him. “While I laid there in your arms feeling safe it came to me, the full realization, how much I loved you. I also realized how much your loving me meant to me. When I turned in your arms and kissed you, it was like it was the first time I’d ever kissed you. When I kissed you, every time I kissed you, I could feel my love for you growing stronger and stronger. I could feel the happiness inside my heart growing and growing. When we made love, it was for the first time. It wasn’t like the times we had just had sex together, it was so much more than that to me. That’s when it hit me, that what I was feeling for you was the same way I had felt for you that time Willow had used that love spell on us. That’s when I finally understood, that was what real love felt like.”

Buffy tightened her hold on Spike and her words became more forceful. “That’s when I became afraid. I know what you told Dawn, that I didn’t say anything to you, not even your name. That when you saw the pain in my eyes that it was then that you thought that I was just letting you love me one more time because I knew you were going to die. But that isn’t true Spike. Yes, I was afraid that something might happen to you. But I was afraid for all of us. I knew that we had a desperate battle ahead of us and that none of us might survive it. But I also knew that we had to do it, because fighting the First the way we were going to try, it was the only chance we had of winning. It wasn’t pain you saw in my eyes, it was fear. That’s why I didn’t say anything to you. That’s why I couldn’t even say your name. I was afraid Spike. I was terrified that if I told you what I was feeling, if I admitted it out loud, I wouldn‘t be able to do it. That I wouldn‘t be able to face the First and risk losing you. So I closed my eyes and held on to you and kept my love for you, and my fear, to myself.”

Tears were standing in Buffys eyes, she blinked them rapidly to clear them. She looked directly into Spikes eyes as he looked down into hers. “When the amulet started working, you called for me. I rushed over and saw you standing in a pillar of light. Beams of light were shooting out of the amulet and they were destroying all the Turok-Han. I knew that the amulet was killing you. You were glowing all over. I knew that the light coming out of the amulet wasn’t from the sun, it was coming from you, it was your soul. I wanted you to pull it off, to stop what it was doing. But you knew it was to late for that, and so did I. I knew that you were going to die. That’s when I knew that I wanted to die with you. I didn’t want to go on living without you Spike. I took your hand, because if we were going to die I wanted us to be together. That’s when I finally had the courage to tell you what I truly felt. That’s when I told you that ‘I loved you’. But you didn’t believe me Spike. You pulled your hand out of mine and told me to go. I didn’t want to go Spike, I didn’t. But when you told me to go, I just did it. I started running and I heard you laughing behind me. I don’t know how I did it, but the next thing I knew I was jumping off a building and landing on top of the school bus as it raced out of town. When we got out of town the bus stopped and when we all looked back there wasn’t anything left. The whole town and the Hellmouth were gone. It was you Spike, you were the one who did it, you saved the world. I was so proud of you Spike, I couldn’t stop from smiling. But that’s when it hit me, that you were gone, that I would never see you again.”

Buffy brought her hands to her face and wiped at the tears, smearing them across her face. She then pressed her hands against Spikes chest, one over his heart. “But I did mean it Spike. When I told you that I loved you, I meant it. I still love you!”

Spike took both of Buffys hands into his and lifting them from his chest raised them to his lips and kissed the backs of her curled fingers. Then looking into her eyes, he told her quietly as he released her hands. “No, you don’t, Slayer.”

Spikes words were like a punch in the stomach and Buffy flinched back from him so hard that she fell backward onto her heels. Spike stood up quickly and stepped around her. Buffy clumsily turned herself around trying to see where Spike was going. When she got herself turned around she saw that he was bending over the pile of his personal belongings. When he stood back up he had something in his hand that he hid behind his leg.. The shock of his words had stunned her speechless, her eyes were wide open as she looked up at him, she couldn’t even cry.

“I’m not calling you a liar Slayer” Spike said in a flat distant voice. “You probably did have some feelings for me, maybe, a little. But it wasn’t ‘me’ that you loved. It was my bright shiny ‘soul‘, wasn‘t it? But there’s something you don’t know Slayer” Spikes voice was becoming harsher as he spoke. “That little trinket that Angel gave you did more that just bring down the Hellmouth. It made me what I am today.” As he said these last words Spike brought his hand out from behind his leg and flipped a wooden stake toward Buffy. In a reflex action her hand snapped up and caught it. Spike let his face morph into vampire mode as he said, “Just another soulless monster for the Slayer to kill.” Buffy reacted without thinking as she raised the stake for a quick strike. Spike took a step back to put himself out of range. He then let his face change back to human as he looked down at Buffy and a grim smile touched his lips. He then turned away from her and pulling the blanket covering the doorway to one side walked out of the little room.

Buffy sat there paralyzed for several long moments until she realized that Spike was gone and she was still holding the wooden stake in her hand as if she were ready to strike with it. She dropped the stake onto the bed and after slowly rising to her feet she walked out of the room. As soon as she came out of the doorway she could see that Spike was gone. Her next conscious awareness had Dawn standing in front of her. She mumbled out in a whisper, “He thinks I only loved his soul Dawnie. He thinks I can’t love him because he doesn’t have it anymore.” Dawn had her arms around her and was saying something to her as the shock finally released it’s hold on her and she started crying. The only thing she was consciously aware of were the words ‘find a way’. She started mumbling these words over and over to herself, “find a way, find a way, find a way……”

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