Spike slowly raised his head and their eyes met. He watched her closely for a moment, then reached out a shaky hand towards her face. “You’ve been cryin’,” he stated quietly, softly wiping away her tears with his thumb.
“Yeah.” She caught his hand and pressed a gentle kiss to his palm. “I’m fine, baby. Don’t worry about me.” He tilted his head to the side, obviously not convinced, and Buffy felt her heart aching for him all over again. No matter what happened, no matter how many horrible ordeals he had to endure, Spike’s first concern would always be with her. Swallowing hard, she managed a small smile. “Giles left. He told us to take all the time we needed.”
Nodding in understanding, Spike opened his mouth to say something. Then he seemed to change his mind. Instead he simply reached out for her, pulling her into his arms and burying his face in her hair. “Sorry,” he whispered, hoarsely.
Frowning, Buffy wrapped her arms around him and hugged him close. “For what?” No response. She tried again, running her hand slowly up and down his back. “Spike? Sorry for what?” He still didn’t say anything, just kept clinging to her, almost desperately. Hesitating only briefly, Buffy pulled back a little. “Spike, look at me.”
It took a moment before he obeyed, somewhat reluctantly. She let her fingers run softly through his hair, looking him straight in the eyes. “What are you sorry for?” He just shrugged, and she had to force back a sigh. “Spike?”
“Yelled at you again.” His bottom lip was trembling now. “Said I wouldn’t do that anymore. I’m sorry.”
Seeing how hard he was struggling to fight back the tears made her own eyes well up again. “Shh, sweetie, it’s okay. You needed to get it out and I’m glad you did. I mean it. It’s not why I was crying.”
Spike gave her a doubtful look, clearly not believing her, and she tried to keep the frustration out of her voice as she went on; “Don’t you get it by now?” He just kept looking at her, a blank expression on his face, and she gently cupped his cheek. “It just breaks my heart when you’re hurting like this. I’d do anything to take away your pain, but I can’t.” She sighed. “Anyway, that’s why I was crying.”
“Oh.” He ducked his head, and Buffy was relieved beyond words that he seemed to simply accept her explanation instead of insisting that he wasn’t worth it. She knew that – not too long ago – he would have done just that.
“Yeah.” She hesitated for a moment, remembering something Giles had mentioned just before leaving the room. Suddenly she felt exhausted, and she could only imagine how Spike must be feeling. “You know, Giles thought it would be a good idea if I came to talk to him some time. Alone.” What Giles had actually said was that he recommended both of them to see him separately, at least once, but she wasn’t sure how Spike would react to that.
He looked up, the surprise evident on his face. “You gonna go?”
“I don’t know.” Buffy bit her lip, somewhat nervously. “Probably.” She paused. “You could do it too, you know.” Holding her breath, she waited for his reaction.
Spike was silent for a moment. “I’ll think about it,” he finally mumbled, clearly too tired to argue. His tone, however, indicated that she shouldn’t get her hopes up. Buffy opened her mouth, but he raised a hand to stop her. “Can’t we just go home now?” he asked, a pleading note in his voice.
She let out a sigh, nodding in agreement. “Yeah. We can go home.”
After quickly going through their options, they had agreed to go back to Spike’s apartment instead of Buffy’s house, none of them in a mood for dealing with Joyce at the moment. Deciding to just rest for a little while and then spend the rest of the night in front of the TV – watch a movie and maybe ordering pizza – Buffy and Spike curled up together on the bed.
Despite insisting that he wasn’t really all that tired, Spike had drifted off almost immediately and was sleeping deeply within minutes. Buffy couldn’t blame him, knowing that he must have worn himself out completely during the session. She on the other hand was unable to go to sleep, having too much going on in her head, too many thoughts rushing through her mind. Pulling the blanket up to cover both of them, she lay her head down to rest on Spike’s chest, slowly stroking his arm as she listened to his breathing.
Even though it had been Spike’s idea to go back to his place, it was obvious that he didn’t feel really comfortable in the apartment anymore, and to tell the truth, neither did Buffy. Too much had happened there. The thought had occurred to her that with Joyce offering Spike a job at the gallery, maybe it was time for him to look for another place. And maybe, just maybe, they could go look for something together.
The idea of her and Spike living together for real sounded very appealing, and she had a feeling Spike would feel the same way, at least she hoped so. She just didn’t know how to bring it up without making it sound like she was pushing things. For some reason, moving in together felt like such a huge step. A step she was more than willing to take, of course, but what if she was wrong and he wouldn’t be ready? A part of her was still terrified that she would go too far and manage to scare him away.
After all, they hadn’t really been together that long. But Buffy knew in her heart that Spike was the one for her, she didn’t doubt it for a second. And she was fairly certain that her feelings were very much mutual. Truth to be told, her feelings for Spike were so intense that it almost scared her sometimes, she just couldn’t imagine living her life without him. The mere thought of ever losing him made her feel like she was choking, it scared her half to death.
Another thing that kept her awake was the thought of her upcoming birthday, and the fact that it was only two days away and she had yet to mention it to Spike. For the last couple of years, her birthdays had turned out unpleasant, to say the least, and she wouldn’t be too upset if she never had to celebrate another birthday again. But maybe Spike wouldn’t see things her way. Maybe he would want to know. Buffy let out a sigh and rolled over on her back, staring up at the ceiling.
It wasn’t like she had deliberately tried to hide it from Spike, it was just that ever since the day they first met, their lives had been like one long roller coaster ride. To say that their relationship so far had been intense would be the understatement of the year. In all honesty, she wasn’t sure she would have mentioned anything even if she’d had nothing but happy memories from her previous birthdays.
Over the last few weeks, just when was she supposed to have brought it up, anyway? And more importantly; what was she supposed to have told him? ‘Hey, Spike, guess what? I know your mother just killed herself and your evil stepfather tried to kill both of us, but my birthday’s coming up. Let’s go out and celebrate!’ Buffy rolled her eyes. How incredibly stupid!
At least her mom hadn’t said anything this year, and for that, Buffy was grateful. She knew that Joyce only meant well, but she always made such a fuss and then in the end, nothing ever turned out as planned. Hopefully, she had finally realized that her daughter just wanted to forget all about her big day. That, or she had simply forgotten. Buffy almost hoped that was the case.
No, this year would be different, she would make sure of that. No matter what happened, she wasn’t going to celebrate her birthday this saturday. She would just stay in bed all day if she had to, pretend to be sick or something. Except doing so meant that she would have to lie to Spike, and she didn’t want to do that. Just insist on a quiet day with neither of them leaving the house, then. Because that seemed to be the only way to make sure that the day wouldn’t turn into the usual disaster.
TBC