Prologue:
The sad thing was that she couldn’t even say it was surreal. It was just another day in Buffydom. Spike and Harmony were grappling with each other on the floor and Drusilla was moaning something about poor Spike before getting away again.
Finally Harmony went stomping off, and Spike stood up and dusted himself off. “Let me down, you idiot,” she ordered, struggling against the chains.
“If I let you down, you’ll leave,” he protested.
His level of delusion was so irritating sometimes. “If you don’t let me down, I’ll kill you,” she threatened. So that didn’t completely make sense. She didn’t care.
“So we had a fight. It's not our first, love, and it doesn't change anything.” He was trying to get the arrow out of his back, turning in circles like a dog chasing its tail.
She rattled the chains. “Let. Me. Down. I want you out. I want you out of this town, I want you off this planet! You don't come near me, my friends, or my family again ever! Understand?”
He rolled his eyes, but he stopped hunting for the arrow long enough to unlock the manacles, muttering the whole time. “It's not that easy. We have something, Buffy. It's not pretty, but it's real, and there's nothing either one of us can do about it. Like it or not, I'm in your life.”
“Get out of the way,” she growled at him. She retrieved her fallen stake and tried to rush out, but he was in her way. Again. “In case you didn’t notice, your harem just vacated, and while you might be fangless, they are not.”
“I’m coming with you,” he announced, finally yanking the arrow out of his back.
“Why?” She was asking him that a lot, it seemed.
“I love you,” he repeated.
That chorus was really getting tiresome. She heaved a deep sigh but let him follow her without further argument. What was the point, really? He'd just trail after her no matter what she said. They overtook Harmony by the gates of Restfield, but Drusilla was long gone. Just another thing to add to her list of things to feel bad about, letting the big ho get away again.
And Spike was still looking at her with that pathetic, dopey look, all the way back to her house. Which as a vampire he shouldn’t even be capable of. It made him look so… human. He also looked… kinda cute, in an insufferable sort of way. If he weren’t a bloodthirsty murderer, she might have coffee with him. Although even if he weren’t a bloodsucking fiend, it would never work out. She didn’t just send them running, she sent them galloping for the hills. A little bit of Buffy, and you were hopping helicopters to get away.
She felt her eyebrows inch up. That was an idea.
“You know what, fine, we’ll go out. That will change your mind quick enough, and it will do less damage to my manicure than kicking your ass.”
He tilted his head at her. “Is this some sort of trick?”
She hung her head and threw up her hands. “I’m giving in, Spike. That’s the only thing that’s going to convince you, so fine already. Just decide what you want to do and call me,” she shouted in frustration.
An enormous grin flashed across his face for a moment before he shoved a cigarette in his mouth. “Don’t have a phone, pet.”
“Use a payphone,” she instructed impatiently. He gave her a look. The he produced a quarter from behind her ear. She had never wanted to stake him so badly.
“How’s Saturday?” He was doing some dumb trick that involved flipping the quarter across his knuckles. So he had dexterity. Big whoop. And nice hands too. Not that she cared.
“Just call me,” she insisted.
This was a good plan, she decided as she kicked her front door shut. This could work.
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Chapter One: Coffee
They were both staring at her. Big confused eyes and mouths hanging slightly open like the words were stuck in transit. Willow cleared her throat and moved her mouth a few times before turning desperately to Xander.
Xander sighed deeply. “Well, I guess that’s understandable.”
“And we love you!” Willow added hastily.
“It's understandable,” Xander repeated, like he was trying to convince himself. “Spike is strong and mysterious and sorta… compact but well muscled.”
“Right. I mean, you’re generally into the grr, which I totally understand, because: werewolf drummer, so demon allure and the whole bad-boy thing. We get it,” Willow babbled, until Xander put a steadying hand on her shoulder.
It was Buffy’s turn to stare. “Oh my god! You have both lost your minds!” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Look, I’m just doing this to prove what a terrible idea it is so he can get over it and go back to just showing up when we need information or an extra pair of fists.”
Xander raised his hand in a way that implied that she was a particularly terrifying history teacher. “What if he doesn’t think it’s a terrible idea?”
Buffy checked her hair again. “They always go, guys. It’s just a matter of time. Eventually I’ll terrify him with my alarming strength or piss him off with my commitment to slaying or my remarkable self-involvement.”
“Okay,” Xander objected, “A, I must have missed your remarkable self-involvement during all the years I was helping you save the world.”
“And B, Spike already knows all of that stuff about you,” Willow finished for him.
Buffy reapplied her lip gloss and smiled at them. “A, you are sweet, and I love you. B, I’m thinking he’ll find it less attractive in larger doses, okay? So I’ll just be my usual charming self, and he’ll soon be giving up the lure of the Hellmouth for danker pastures.”
Willow and Xander exchanges looks again. “Then why did you ask us over for fashion advice on your date outfit?” Willow asked.
“Right. Since you’re so big with the not caring,” Xander put in.
Buffy frowned. “I needed to know if this outfit says ‘I don’t care what you think’. Well?”
Willow studied her for a moment. “I think the addition of a bra would help send that message.”
Buffy made a face. It was just that the straps would show if she took off her jacket. It was nothing to do with wanting to show off that you could still be all firm and perky without being undead. Nothing whatsoever. A loud honking interrupted her thoughts. She peeked out the window to confirm that it was the old De Soto idling in front of the house.
“He honks for you?” Willow looked like she wanted to say something more.
“Pure class, that Spike,” Xander said with a sage nod.
“Be… safe,” Willow added, before turning as red as her hair and hiding her face behind her hands when both Buffy and Xander rounded on her with horrified expressions.
“What am I, vamp tramp?” Buffy scoffed. “No way he’s getting lucky on the first date,” she muttered as she flounced out of her room and down the stairs.
Willow and Xander sat in silence, listening to the car putter away down the street. They took twin deep breaths. “So…” Xander started off. “Just me, or did she imply that not only was there the possibility of future dates, but of possible sex-having on those dates.”
“Oh, this is bad,” Willow agreed. “Very, very bad.”
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“Come on, Slayer. It wasn’t that bad,” Spike protested as he opened the passenger door for her.
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Are you kidding me? What was with that second guy? He just mumbled like crazy and then screamed ‘vagina!’ every tenth word. It was creepy.”
“Mother issues,” Spike explained. Buffy wrinkled her nose. “Speaking of, how is your Mum?”
Buffy sobered. “Okay, I guess. The doctors keep saying she’s fine, but I don’t know really.” She really didn’t want to talk about it. “That one girl was okay, I guess. The one with all the animal stuff. That one about the gazelle.”
Spike nodded and she found herself watching him drive. It was really weird. They were having a normal conversation. That kind of thing had been starting to happen before she found out about his weird crush. He kept saying he had changed. Had he?
“Good use of imagery,” he said finally. “Maybe borrowed a bit too much from Blake.”
Well, it had just gotten weirder. She was actually discussing imagery and poets with Spike. His roots were showing. She wondered what his natural color would look like if he let it grow in.
“Less said about that last bloke, the better.”
Buffy laughed in agreement. “That guy and his soul brethren are the reason I’ve avoided The Espresso Pump on open mic night all these years.” He turned to smile at her and she had to look away, because he looked way too cute when he was being all friendly and relaxed. Buffy kept her eyes on the dashboard for the rest of the trip.
It wasn’t a long drive, and soon he was opening the passenger door for her in front of her house. “What’s with the chivalry all of a sudden?” she asked as he escorted her up the walk. “You couldn’t even be bothered come to the door earlier.”
Spike smirked. “Knew your little Scooby pals were upstairs. Didn’t feel like being inspected or interrogated. Next time I’ll ring the bell, pet.”
His tone was irresistible somehow. “See that you do,” she teased back.
She realized what exactly she had said when he grabbed her elbow and said, “So, dinner on Saturday? I can pick you up after sunset.”
Before she could think of a good reason not to agree to a second date, he kissed her. It was just a light touch, his lips brushing against hers. His hands barely touched her, no body contact.
Lust roared through her like a 747 taking off. She remembered those lips, and how he could keep kissing her until she was breathless. Remembered the hands that were barely touching her elbows but could do the most amazing things against other parts of her. He stepped back like he was maybe a little scared she’d sock him in the nose.
“So, Saturday then?” he repeated in a soft voice, looking oddly shy. He licked his lips and she gulped, and then quickly nodded a few times before practically throwing herself through the front door.
Dawn grinned at her from the landing and waved her fists happily. Buffy swept past her sister and flung herself across her bed, burying her head under one of the pillows. This was bad. Very, very bad.
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Chapter Two: Dinner
Buffy gave them an impatient stare while Xander looked queasy and Anya looked bored. Willow and Tara were both concentrating very hard on their spell books. She huffed and re-crossed her arms. “Look, so I couldn’t run him off on the first date. It does usually take me longer than that. Give me time.”
Anya perked up. “What about the young man with whom you had the ill-considered sexual liaison? That only lasted one date, correct? Maybe sex will drive Spike away more efficiently,” she proposed.
“No!” objected everyone else at the table.
“I am not sleeping with Spike just to make him leave town,” Buffy affirmed. Glances pinged across the table as everyone parsed that sentence. “I just need a restaurant recommendation here, people. Because I am so not sitting through another spoken word night at the Pump.”
“Oh, was vagina! guy there?” Tara asked.
“Oh my god!” Buffy confirmed.
“Maybe somewhere with steaks?” Willow suggested. “Because the homophonic is suggestive and he could order something rare?”
“Just for the record,” Xander spoke, “yeesh.”
“Aren’t steak places kinda nice though?” Buffy wondered.
Anya shrugged. “He can afford it, between his family fortune and the sell-off from the treasure he found in the tunnels.” She looked around at their confused glances. “I’m sorry, did you not know he just took your money for the amusement value?”
Buffy absorbed this information. “Okay, so that place out by the water then.”
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Dinner had been nice, maybe a little too nice. She’d had too many glasses of wine, and that was the only reason her head was spinning. No way was Spike’s hand on her back in any way responsible for that. She turned to look up at his face as they walked along through the dry sand in the moonlight.
This was far too romantic, getting dressed up and having a nice dinner with actual conversation, and then taking a stroll along the beach with ice cream cones. Too comfortable. He wasn’t even prodding her for a chat, seemingly just happy to mosey along and watch her lick her mint chocolate cone in silence. Companionable silence. Wasn’t that what books called it? Which was bad. Because she and Spike were supposed to be enemies, not companions.
And bad because she hadn’t felt this nice since before her mom had gotten sick. In fact being with Spike had felt way too nice ever since she’d let him see her crumpled like an old sack over her mom. She hadn’t let anyone else in like that, so why Spike? Because he somehow wasn’t real, being a vampire and all?
But he was real. His gently encouraging words and his wonderful silence and his hand pressing against her skin just where the back of her dress opened to show off her back…. Oh, she so shouldn’t have had that last glass of wine.
She tripped over something in the sand. Alcohol vied with her slayer grace and she stumbled hard, sending the scoop of ice cream tumbling down her face and chest to plop in the sand. Spike’s arm slid around her waist to catch her as her hand came up to clutch his shoulder for support.
“You okay, love?”
His eyes were bright in the moonlight and she could feel the muscle move in his arm, the effortless strength of his embrace. Totally too much wine. She shivered when the breeze touched the damp spots left by her toppled cone. Her lower lip jutted out. “I’m all sticky.”
“Let’s fix that, shall we,” he whispered, his voice dropping an octave. Then his mouth was on hers, not light nor fleeting this time. Instead the caress was firm and insistent and then there was tongue, tracing lightly along her lips and down her jaw to erase the traces of ice cream, back to her mouth which opened.
Bad idea! she screamed at herself, because now that she was really kissing him, she didn’t want to stop kissing him. No more wine ever she admonished herself as she brought her other hand up to massage his scalp.
Buffy could feel her hair standing up like there was an electrical storm and without an answering heartbeat hers sounded thunderous in her ears. She was supposed to be stopping, she dimly remembered, but it felt good. When he pulled back to let her breath, his eyes were dark and heavy. “I think I missed a few spots,” he rumbled against her neck. She whimpered in a really unheroic superhuman demon-fighter way as his lips and tongue traveled around, hunting phantom smears of ice cream.
“Get a room!”
She came back to her senses with a snap and pushed him away, hard. Not even looking to see who was yelling at them, she retrieved the shoes she’d dropped when he started kissing her. “I need to get home,” she panted.
“Oh, right.” His voice was shaky. She couldn’t even think about looking at him, not until her heartbeat slowed down. Now the sand felt gritty between her toes and the light breeze had turned unpleasantly cold.
He blasted the heater in the car and sat unmoving in the driver’s seat until she finally turned to look at him. When his eyes met hers, she shivered again. “What?”
“You always run this hot and cold, slayer?” he asked petulantly.
“If you can’t handle it…” she retorted. Maybe the plan was working after all. Maybe he was beginning to see that having was not so pleasing a thing as wanting, or whatever it was Xander had said about her strategy.
She didn’t want to think about the way that thought made her chest clench.
“Why do I always fall for the moody birds?” he asked the sky. He lit a cigarette and took a drag.
“Hey!” she protested loudly. She leaned over him and cranked the window down. Which was a mistake, because the physical configuration was a little too suggestive, so she shouldn’t have been surprised when he tossed the cigarette out and guided her face back up to his. She really hadn’t meant to crawl up into his lap, but once he was kissing her again that just seemed like the logical thing to do.
This time his hands weren’t so gentle. His fingers clenched when she squirmed against him. It was intoxicating how strong he was, that she had to apply real force when she shifted in his embrace. Intoxicating… the wine, right, the wine was why she was letting his hand stray up from her back and around the underside of her breast. It was the wine, and…
Screw it, screw the wine. Why was it so bad to want something? She wanted him. It was crazy and probably lethally stupid, but it felt damn good. His insistent mouth, his cool fingers untying the sash of her wrap dress and then moving up to explore her bare breast, and then lower into her lap.
“Oh God!” She mewed and leaned back against the steering column. Deprived of her mouth, his own found her breast instead. The vibration of his moans echoed in her and she laughed. He really knew what he was doing with fingers too, no awkwardness or adolescent fumbling. Two fingers working inside her against just the right spot and his thumb stroking her clit in the exact right rhythm.
She caught her breath. “No. We have to stop. We can’t.”
In answer, his free arm pulled her in close, his busy fingers quickly adjusting to the new angle. He nipped her earlobe. “Let me have my little fantasy moment, pet. Getting the pent-up slayer off in my lap.”
“I am not pent up,” she protested. He just laughed and kept working her, picking up speed. “Spike,” she managed. “This isn’t fair.”
“Sod fair.” His voice was spooky in her ear, and commanding in a way that really shouldn’t have made her even wetter. She felt her clammy underwear tear away as he kissed her again, and then it was just the night air and his hand caressing her.
Buffy leaned back again, bracing herself against his knees and the steering wheel. “Spike,” she sad slowly, just in case he didn’t understand. “I’m going to come.”
He groaned and squeezed his eyes shut, but he didn’t stop. She watched him bite his lip and then she couldn’t watch anything anymore. Her eyes closed and just gave in, screaming like a lunatic. But then again Spike was probably into that. She was dimly aware of a zipper sliding and when she briefly opened her eyes she saw her wrecked underwear in his other hand, moving in his open pants. She whimpered against an aftershock as he moaned and shook, and then she laid her spinning head on his shoulder.
“Admit it, love, you needed that.” Turning her head, she watched him lick his fingers clean of her, which should have been wiggy but instead made her think of a number of additional things that she needed. He turned to kiss her and she ignored whatever he did with her messy panties. Back in the passenger side, she futilely tried to right her dress and hair while he drove, dopey smile pasted on his face.
As they got closer to the house, she sighed. “I have to patrol Restfield tomorrow,” she said quietly.
“I’ll be in the neighborhood,” he pointed out. “Could tag along, if you like.”
“Yeah, okay,” she breathed. The second the car stopped in front of her house, she reached for the door handle. Taking a deep breath, she stopped herself from fleeing like a complete chicken and leaned over to kiss him, long and thorough. Then she bolted for the house, belatedly realizing she’d left her dressy sandals in the floorboard.
“What happened to your hair?” Dawn asked in the most irritating little-sisterly manner possible.
Buffy ignored her and tried not to run up the stairs. She tossed the crumpled dress aside and encased herself in her robe. For some reason she didn’t want to take a shower quite yet. She reached for the phone, counting the rings until her friend picked up. “Willow? I think maybe I screwed up.”
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This a very different fic for me, so feedback is very much appreciated!
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Author’s Note: Thanks to the wonderful Kar for the beta job and thanks to redwulfe for the inspiration! I realize this doesn’t exactly fit his challenge, but I gave it my best shot. If you want an ‘everything changes’ story, I humbly refer you to “Borrowed Time”.
This was a different writing experience for me. I’m used to writing Buffy and Spike after her death, and they are so changed by that. It was fun to write something lighter in tone. Also, I know Buffy is below legal drinking age, but I’m wagering she could still get served now and then.
This was a different writing experience for me. I’m used to writing Buffy and Spike after her death, and they are so changed by that. It was fun to write something lighter in tone. Also, I know Buffy is below legal drinking age, but I’m wagering she could still get served now and then.