I’ve been here four days longer than I’m supposed to. I’m using the money I have squirreled away in my bank account, which after what I got from Spike and my mom, is enough to sustain me for quite some time. Not that I plan to use all of it. I am thinking…
I’m thinking of heading toward Boston. For what, I’m not sure. Closure maybe. I feel like I need to face my father one last time. I can’t let him go on thinking he got the best of me. I can’t let him go on thinking he succeeded in getting rid of me. I feel like all these things are starting to come to a head now and I just need to start somewhere. God knows I can’t face Spike right now. Maybe I wasn’t meant to settle there. Maybe I was meant to work some shit out with him and then move on to find my own life. I don’t know. I don’t know where I belong; I only know where I want to belong and where I felt like I could belong. But as per usual, I was wrong and what I wanted was wrong. I hate that word. Wrong. It’s right up there with the word “No.”
And I can’t be around Spike while he’s doing whatever with Fred. I just can’t bring myself to do it. I don’t do jealousy well. At all. It’s best for him. It’s best for me.
I hate my life.
“When are you coming home?” Spike demanded.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“That I don’t know.”
“Pet, it’s time now, huh? Don’t you think it’s time to come home?”
“No, it’s not time yet. What have you been up to?”
He sighed heavily, raking a hand through his hair. She really didn’t get how desperate he was feeling at that moment in time did she? “I’ve been working, reading, watching TV, not doing all that much really.”
“What about Fred? Have you seen her?”
“Here and there.”
“Well, why don’t you invite her over and have dinner or something?”
“Buffy… What are you doing?”
“I’m talking to you.”
“Don’t play games with me like you did with Angel,” he hissed.
“Spike--”
“When are you fucking coming home!” he shouted then, frustrated.
“I don’t know I’m going to Boston!”
“What?”
“I’ve decided to go to Boston.”
“Why?”
“Why do you think?”
“To see your father.”
“Give the boy a medal,” Buffy remarked dryly.
“Why?”
“I just feel I have to.”
“No, you don’t have to. Why are you going to put yourself through that Buffy?”
“Maybe I’m just a glutton for punishment . . . I just feel like I have to. Just one last time try and talk with him. See him. If he treats me like shit again, I’ll know.”
“Buffy…listen, all right? You want to go, fine, but let me come with you so you don’t have to do it alone.”
“That’s sweet, but no. I have to do this on my own.”
“Why?” he asked incredulously.
“I don’t know.”
“Would you stop fucking saying ‘I don’t know’?”
“Spike,” she sighed heavily. “You ever take a journey? A journey with yourself?”
“I don’t…I guess. I feel like I have been on one already.”
“Well, this is my journey, and maybe yours. You said yourself we were too dependent on each other.”
“I wish I’d never said it,” he muttered.
“And you were right. Well, this is a journey I have to take and I have to do it on my own so I can get some clarity…I don’t know what’s going to happen when I get to Boston and see him. Most likely nothing, but I have to do it. Alone.”
“That’s what this is about? You having done things for so long on your own and now that it’s been brought to your attention that you might need someone there, you don’t want to admit it and you don’t want any part of it.” He was angry and bitter and he didn’t care anymore.
“No, that’s not it at all. You were the one that told me to go in the first place so don’t start making this out to be my fault!”
“So, what? You’re punishing me now?”
“No! Spike, I just need some time to myself to see him and get some closure and I need to do it alone. I will be back. I promised you I would be and I will.”
“Yeah, next month,” he muttered. “What about your job? You have a job here, remember?”
“It was only temporary. Fire me if you see fit.”
“You’re irresponsible.”
Buffy snorted. “Funny, I don’t see it that way. When I lived in Boston, I never missed a day. I couldn’t afford to.”
“Then what do you call what you’re doing now?”
“Taking care of unfinished business that comes before my job right now, Spike. Just think—if I hadn’t come home to bury my mother and skip out on my job in Boston, you never would have been graced with my presence.”
“Buffy, honestly--”
“I have to go now.”
“Where? Where do you have go now?”
“I’m at the airport now. I’m boarding my plane. I’ll call you when I arrive if it’s not too late your time.”
“Call me no matter—“ Dial tone. “What.” With a roar of anger, Spike flung his phone across the room and it shattered.
Being back in Boston was strange to Buffy. One part of her felt as though she were home in some respect, and the other part felt out of place, however, that pretty much defined her entire stay in Boston for those five years. Home, and yet, not. She felt as though since her parents had split, she had been on a constant search for where she felt completely at home. The closest she’d come to it was in Sunnydale. With Spike. With him she could be who she was: crazy, defiant, stubborn, nurturing, loving and caring. She could be all the things inside her that ached to be free and let them out once in a while, but only once in a while, for she feared that given free reign, they’d run amuck. With Spike she let those things out of their cages more and more frequently, feeling she had a jumping off point, and a safe place to land with him.
It was those things that made her care for him more than she should. Unaccustomed to using the dirty “L” word when it was not in relation to family, it felt even foreign in her mind. She felt a whole lot of it inside her, ready to spew forth and cover Spike like a warm security blanket that he’d always want and need, but would never go without. When the dam burst, she feared it would take them both under with her and there would be no return from it. Buffy could be a rather giving and passionate spirit when she felt there was someone deserving of it. So far, it had been Mr. Gordo, her one time sleep companion in the shape of stuffed pig, and now, Spike.
Which brought her to her current situation: Her father. The seeing of, and the being seen part of her trip.
Whatever the outcome was, she wondered if it’d be as life-changing as these sorts of things were supposed to be, or if she would leave, none the worse for wear, feeling as though she’d said goodbye to an old friend that she’d just caught up with, reminisced over old times, healed a few wounds left, only to think fondly back on it, and smile with only a pin prick of sadness to follow her musings.
The winters in Boston were always bitter and Buffy cursed the fact that she hadn’t thought through the weather conditions better. Thankfully, she’d arrived just before the shops were to close, and so jet-lagged and weather beaten, she purchased herself a couple pairs of jeans, socks, two sweaters, a winter coat, a hat, gloves and a scarf. Thankfully, she had at least sneakers to keep her feet warm. Tossing her light cardigan that did nothing to shield her from the cold in her suitcase; Buffy hailed a cab and had it take her to the Sheraton, the closest hotel she knew of near her father’s penthouse.
She’d check in, call Spike, try to get some sleep and tomorrow, she would see her dear old Dad.
Chapter Eighteen
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“You sound hoarse,” Buffy observed.
Spike sighed, “Do I?”
“Mmm…and rather annoyed.”
“Where are you?”
“In a hotel. Why is your cell not working?”
“I threw it. What hotel?”
“Sheraton, right in the heart of the city. What’d you throw it for?”
“You pissed me off with your refusal to come home.”
“Oh.”
“Have you seen him?”
“Not yet. I figure I need a full night’s rest to do that. My body is all out of whack now; I don’t even know what the hell time it’s on anymore.”
“Buffy, I’m worried about you.” He sounded so very weary.
“Do I exhaust you?”
“At times you most definitely try me. Why do you ask?”
“Because you sound tried.”
“What do you want me to say? You traipse off to Boston after opting to not come home and you don’t even want me to be there with you when you face your father. Have you learned nothing Buffy? You are not alone. Not anymore.”
“I know,” she said softly. “I’m sorry.”
“What are you thinking?”
“Right now I’m thinking damn you for making me cry.”
“Let me come out there. Let me be there with you.”
“So I can introduce you as the man that my mother married over him? I don’t think so.”
“You could just introduce me as Spike. Even William if you prefer.”
“And you’re what to me?”
“Your boyfriend.”
Buffy laughed--a sort of hysterical kind of laugh that stopped just as abruptly as it started. “I don’t think so.”
“Your friend then. It’s not like you have to define it! Are you …ashamed of me?”
“What? No! Spike, God, why are you making this about you? It has nothing to do with you! This is about me and my Dad and my head.”
“Your head?”
“Yes. I need to think and get my head on straight and I can’t do that when you’re with me.”
“I make you lose your head?” he sounded almost hopeful by the thought.
“Yes. You do.”
“You make me lose mine, too,” Spike said quietly.
“Like my mom did?”
“Buffy--”
“I have to go. I’ll call you tomorrow,” she said, choking back a sob and feeling incredibly guilty and ridiculous for even asking that question. How stupid was she? She truly was a glutton for punishment!
Shutting her phone off as soon as she hung up, Buffy sobbed for all the things she could never have, but so desperately wanted—her mom, her father’s love, Spike, and a life full of things she could simply be content with having without always feeling like she had her nose pressed to a glass window, always wanting what was just out of reach.
January 7, 2006
The girl is thickheaded, that’s all there is to it. Why won’t she listen to me? Why does she always insist on doing things her way? She leaves no room for other options. It’s bad for her to be there alone to face her father and no, she doesn’t have to do it alone. Hank is a bastard, he’s going to hurt her and I’m not going to be there to pick her up when she falls.
Or am I just thinking she’ll need to be picked up, but maybe she really doesn’t need to be picked up. She is a strong girl. She was right in having been through a lot, and I have a feeling she’s about to go through a lot more.
I’m recognizing in me the need to be needed. I want to help her. I want to …I want to do something that I can’t do. I want her to need me as I need her. If she needs me, then she won’t leave me. How sad is that?
Christ, I feel like I’m losing my fucking head! Maybe she’s right. Maybe this is what we both need. Time and distance from each other, so then why the fucking hell do I feel nuttier the longer she’s gone?
I know why. I know. Like I said if she decides she doesn’t need me…or not even that. If she doesn’t want to come back, if she’s grown tired of me, or if she thinks she doesn’t want or need to be around the guy that married her mother anymore…what if she meets someone else? What if she meets them and they convince her to stay with them …then what? She promises to call, to write, to email and promises to visit except years go by and she doesn’t…she fades from my life and I’m left here, pining.
And I never felt this way with Joyce. Never. Never felt this all consuming passion and need where she was concerned. I felt safe and secure and loved, but not the same. Not with the intensity added onto it like I do with Buffy. Joyce never challenged me. Buffy challenges me. She forces me to see things in different ways. She makes me become the nurturer instead of the nuturee – Christ, is that a word? And she’s gotten me back into literature too. Well, I mean, I did get the books and all, but she reads like a demon too. She asks me questions, she makes me think, and she pushes me. With her I’m someone. I’m a man. I’m learning who I am everyday, for everyday she forces me to learn a different facet of myself.
Like right now, I’m learning I have no patience.
I’m also learning what it means to have guilt in spades. Here I am with all these feelings that I never had for my wife. Aren’t you supposed to marry the person you have these feelings for?
“You’re not here with me.”
Spike looked up from the dinner he wasn’t eating, but poking at. He smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry, Fred.”
“You miss Buffy,” she said simply and sat back in the black vinyl booth, pushing her plate aside. They’d gone out to dinner to a little Italian Bistro that Fred had wanted to try, and considering all he was going to do was mope home alone, he figured what the hell?
Spike said nothing for a long time, contemplating how to tell the girl he was with that she was right, he was thinking of another. “I’m sorry, Fred,” he said finally. Smooth Spike, real smooth, he thought.
“Why are you sorry?”
“Because we’re…and you’re…” he sat back. “Now I’m not sure anymore.”
Fred smiled. “Look, I’ll be honest with you. I like you. I think you’re a good man, but I’m not looking for a relationship right now and I kind of knew already that you weren’t ‘available’.”
“Oh?” he asked curiously, wondering if his heart had been on his sleeve the whole time.
“Well, with your wife and all…” she looked away, blushing, “I’m sorry, that was rude of me.”
He shrugged, “Not really. Most wouldn’t bother even hanging around someone like me.”
“Buffy does.”
“Buffy is my wife’s—late wife’s—daughter. Buffy had nowhere else to go.”
“And she realized she needed you, and that you needed her.”
Spike stared at Fred, bewildered.
Fred laughed, “Relax, Spike. I’m a psychologist, its part of my job to read people. It’s hard to not have my professional training spill into my personal life.”
“Should have known better than to befriend a shrink,” Spike grinned. “So, what’s your prognosis of me?”
“I think you’re human.”
“So, pretty bad huh?”
“Why don’t you tell me a little about your relationship before Buffy came home?”
“You sure you want that? I’m not going to pay you for this appraisal of me,” he joked nervously.
“This one is on the house,” Fred smiled. “I’m just your friend that happens to be a professional ‘shrink’.”
“Sorry about that,” Spike said sheepishly.
“Eh, don’t worry about it. Look, I think you need someone to talk to that isn’t Buffy. Am I right?”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
“So, why don’t you start from the beginning? Start with Joyce.”
“Well…when I met Joyce, I had just lost my parents and I was a directionless sod…”