Spike didn’t realize that he had fallen asleep until he started awake in the iron darkness of his wing. It took a few minutes for everything to come rushing back, but not nearly as long as he would have liked. He indulged a few minutes to himself; releasing small, quaking breaths that made his body tremble for the weight of their unexpected necessity. He had never felt the urge to breathe before as he did now. It burned him with need. As though the weight of existence depended on it.
It didn’t take long to decipher that he wasn’t alone in the room. Another beat and he knew he wasn’t even alone in the bed. Her sweet scent encompassed him, tied in with the knowledge of the tears she had shed. It angered and hurt all within the same swoop. Those were two emotions he could easily learn to live without.
He had hoped that their earlier conversation would have put an end to this, because he wasn’t sure how reliable his defenses were. It was a hard bargain, driving a man who finally had what he had wanted for years to a point where accepting meant the denial of everything he was. Buffy was in his bed because she wanted to be. She had traveled across the ocean because this was where she said she belonged. She had ended it with The Immortal because he was alive. She was offering her hand in unity. A chance at everything he had wanted for so long.
But she had betrayed him. She had betrayed him and herself. Her own bloody convictions. The weight of every promise she gave that he had never doubted. The feel of her impounding self-loathing as it poured onto his being. He couldn’t take it. Not from her. Not after everything they had gone through together.
He was not going to be some consolation prize.
Spike’s hands fisted. He couldn’t have her. She was off-limits.
A small whimper rang through the air and he felt her shudder behind him. And he realized the next instant that she was awake. She was awake and crying.
Oh God.
Can’t give me a bloody break, can you?
He didn’t know if he was demanding that of God or his own weakened resolution. He hated tears. Hated them on himself but most especially on people he loved. When Buffy wept, it crumpled everything he was.
At that moment, he would have given everything in the world not to love her as he did, because this was going to cause more pain than he felt he deserved. And not for what he should say.
For what he shouldn’t.
“Buffy?” There was a jump and a sharp gasp. He was surprised that she hadn’t sensed him awaken. Spike drew in a breath and switched sides to face her, his eyes taking in the expanse of her back with a watering gaze and hands that ached to touch her. “Pet? Come on, don’ do this.”
“Sorry,” she said hoarsely.
“We’re beyond sorry’s. Have been for years.”
He immediately regretted saying it, but did not offer to take it back. And she did not call him on it. Instead, she shivered and nodded her agreement, remaining steadfast with her back to him, shifting slightly so he could see her hand playing with the pillow.
“I meant for waking you up. I just…I couldn’t go out there yet.”
Spike swallowed hard, quivered, and caved. He needed to touch her, if only once. If only to feel that what she had offered him was real. He knew it would likely and rightly sign away his undoing, but he could no sooner stop himself than rip the part of his heart that she owned out of his chest so he could respectively return it. The feel of her was amazing. The way her skin trembled beneath his touch. The whimpering sigh she released at his feel.
He allowed himself this. Closed his eyes briefly to absorb her. Buffy. His Slayer. His goddess.
His own personal Judas Iscariot.
“Don’ cry,” he whispered. “Please don’ cry.”
Buffy hardened a bit at that. He didn’t blame her. “It’s not like I have a choice here.”
Spike perked a brow in spit of himself. “’F I’m bein’ unfair, then please tell me how. ‘Cause the way I see it…”
“No.” A small ripple ran through her, and finally she turned to face him. She must have expected his touch to disappear at movement, but it did not. He would not forfeit what little he allowed himself so easily.
But it was even more difficult with her this close. With her warmth enveloping him. With everything they had sacrificed coming together.
Then she started speaking. And his world fell away.
“I wished sometimes that I had died with you, you know?”
“Rot. Don’ say that.”
“Not because you were gone.” There was a shiver and she sighed heavily against his touch. “I could live again. And I did. It was the best thing anyone had ever done for me. But I don’t know how to live. Eight years fighting, two times dead, and you kinda forget how to live.” Buffy chuckled humorlessly. “I didn’t have a death wish. I’ve had too many of those. And I don’t think it was ever…serious. Me wanting to be dead. But my world turned upside down so fast. I knew it was going to happen. Hell, I preached about it for months.”
Spike quirked a smile at that.
“But then it happened, and everything changed. I couldn’t even go home anymore. There was no home. I couldn’t talk to Mom about it, because there was no cemetery anymore. I think there’s something about cemeteries that make people talk to the dead…” She paused. “The six-feet-under type of death, you know.”
“’Course.”
“Well, I didn’t have that anymore. And Will…we hadn’t been close since before I died. Before jumping off the tower and everything. You know that more than anyone.”
Spike nodded again, his treacherous hands playing wistfully with her hair.
“Xander left. We still talk to him and everything, but I think losing Anya was like the last thing he could tolerate. It didn’t hit him until later. Kinda like me. Until we were out of there.” Buffy paused again, her eyes blurring with tears. “And I couldn’t go to you, because there was no you. There was Dawnie…but I didn’t want to…and despite how things have changed, hell would freeze over before I talked to Faith.”
“How is Faith?”
“Doing what I’m doing. Training. Helping the new girls, and lord, there are a bunch of new girls.” She paused thoughtfully. “She came here to help, too. I don’t know if she’s still here or not.”
He nodded. “Still with the principal?”
“They were for a while. She’s seeing some congressman now, if you can believe that.”
There was an unlikely snort. “Evil an’ politics, luv. ‘m findin’ more an’ more that they go hand-in-hand.”
A long uncomfortable beat settled between them. Then she was talking again.
“So I think I died a little that day…when you were gone,” she whispered, eyes cast downward. “It was real. Didn’t hit me until we were halfway across Nevada and stopping, like I said, that I would never see you again. I kinda…I looked around the bus at times, thinking you’d pop up. ‘Cause even before, when you left, you were still out there, you know? You left after…things ended between us.” He was glad she opted to exclude the manner in which said things had ended. “But you were still out there. Not this time, though. You wouldn’t be coming back. And I’d realize it, then my hand would burn and my heart would hurt a little, but I’d ignore it. Move on. I didn’t realize that it was me dying.”
There was another long pause. Spike was halfway attempted to balk and call her melodramatic, but there was something in her voice that screamed the truth. And it astonished him. Astonished him enough to curl his arm around her waist. To sink a level lower than he wanted to admit himself.
Just for now. Let me have now.
Her eyes fell shut at the enhanced contact, and that enchanted him. “It wasn’t enough, though. It came in small increments. Willow finally approached me after we got to London, and I…I guess I hit a wall. Headfirst, full-speed, the works. But we started talking finally. And I told her. I told her everything I missed. All my regrets. Not just about you, but mostly about you. How much I hated myself for not taking chances when they should’ve been taken. For treating you the way I did that year. It wasn’t fair. I was a monster, and because I’m the chick, everything got pinned on you.” She met his gaze, and the emotion storming her front stole his breath from his lips. “I’m so sorry, Spike. For that. Did I ever tell you that I’m sorry? I’d do everything different if I could. Go back and…just realize what you were doing for me. How you were…I mean, you didn’t act perfectly, but what you did was a result of what I did. And I’ll never…”
The sincerity behind her voice astonished him.
“I’ve never been as sorry for anything in my life as I am for that.” She sighed deeply, shifting so that she was lying on her back, her wrist resting against her forehead. “The things I told you, everything…it wasn’t true. None of it was true. I had time after time to tell you that last year, and I chickened out. That was my fault.” Another grave chuckle rumbled through her lips. “Funny, isn’t it? We often pick at the things in others that we’re so afraid are coming out in ourselves. I called you a monster because that was what I was. I called you dead inside, because I was dead inside. I wanted to make you the embodiment of everything that was wrong with me so I’d have something hurt. And it did hurt. It hurt me, but it hurt you so much worse.” She turned to him, grasping his hand intently. “I’m so sorry for that. I never told you how sorry I am.”
He watched her for careful seconds, schooling his own innate need to reassure her. To tell her right off that nothing that had occurred that year had been wholly either one of their faults. But words froze in his throat, and he found himself at a standstill. There was a serious part of him that was still licking at scars; his own words so callously spoken earlier attested to that. But he wouldn’t allow himself to take them back, because despite how much he loved her, he had meant them.
“It was Willow’s idea that I start dating again. I didn’t want to, but she thought it’d be good for me.” Buffy expelled and shifted slightly. “And despite whatever you might think, I did have serious reservations about The Immortal. It’s not like I went searching for a vampire. Hell, after everything I’ve been through, a vampire was the last thing I wanted. And…I don’t know why I agreed. I really don’t. He promised me that he wouldn’t, you know, be vampiric.” She grinned lightly off his look. “Yeah, stupid Buffy. Of course, I know he was now. Not in the usual ways, ‘cause that’s not his style, as we well know. But enough. I guess I just turned a blind eye to it. Makes sense. He’s not the type of guy to compromise when he can get away with the full steal. I just didn’t see it.” A frustrated fist pounded relentlessly against the mattress. “And I don’t know why, Spike. That’s what bothers me most of all. This is…me, you know? I don’t turn blind eyes when people are getting hurt. But I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to make the same mistakes over again. I spent so much time hating you for what you were that I never appreciated everything else. Didn’t appreciate you for what you weren’t.” She shook her head and hissed a spiteful breath. “I thought…I guess I thought that I was making it up, somehow. Making up everything that I did to you. But I was wrong. I was so wrong. I smiled and nodded and pretended everything was all right, but there’s only one you, and I missed you so much.” There was a short pause and she turned away again, wiping irately at her eyes. “I guess it was just like you and Harm, but I was trying to pretend it wasn’t.”
Spike waited a long minute, studying her with both skepticism and empathy. He wanted to reach out and touch her again, but didn’t dare will that much of himself away. With one touch needlessly came the want of others, and he didn’t trust himself to deny his body the pleasure of her nearness. Having her this close was torture enough. Give a mouse a sodding cookie. And he was effectively torn. He wanted so desperately to believe her. To trust that whatever had concurred between her and The Immortal came out of some innate need to make amends with every wrong that had connected them in the past. But it still hurt. He knew well enough for what he had seen. What he understood about The Immortal. Everything that made him what he was correspondingly made everything else.
He released another deep breath, frowning as his body again called out for water. Strange. There were several truths to be reckoned with—more so than he had presumed to hope against. “’S nice sentiment an’ all,” he murmured. “But Buffy, I wasn’ born in the bloody barn. The Immortal’s been around forever. I know his rep, an’ I know you. What good li’l girls like you enjoy when the lights go out.”
Her eyes fell shut and she waved him off dismissively. “It so completely was not about that.”
“Wasn’t it?”
“Really. I didn’t even know he had a rep for it until…” She flushed and glanced away, and he felt the familiar strings of angered jealousy tighten across his chest, his hand fisting to keep from pounding into the nearest pillow. “And it kinda surprised me,” she said quickly. “I think a part of the reputation is more how many lovers he’s had. And yeah, the sex was…good…but…it wasn’t the best.”
Spike blinked at her. “I would take a hint an’ run with that one, but I don’ feature gettin’ anywhere.”
A smirk flashed across her face. “He talked to me about you, you know. Just a little. Said you, he, and Angel often came at a crossroads. He also told me about snatching Darla and Dru away on selected occasions.”
His eyes widened. “There were selected occasions?”
“You didn’t know?”
He paused for a second, gaze dropping to the mattress. “Knew of one. Others? Well, can’t say it surprises.”
“He also said they were massively pleased with his performance.” A frown furrowed her brow. “He was really into himself, now that I think about it. But anyway, I’m guessing that since that was a hundred plus years ago, you’ve…ummm…well…” She smiled shyly at his expression. “I dunno. Maybe not. Maybe it’s because…it doesn’t matter now.”
A pang struck deep within his chest for no reason other than the promise of her will. And he knew irreparably that whatever distance he put between them, whether for her or his benefit, was something he could never falter. Sometimes pain was worth it, other times it wasn’t.
She had always been worth it. He didn’t know when that had changed for him.
If it ever had.
“Buffy…with what I said earlier…”
She held up a hand. “Don’t.”
“With whatever happens, I don’ want you walkin’ out of here thinkin’ that anythin’ has changed.” Spike paused considerately, tilting his head. “I don’ know when things got so wonky. When others started matterin’ to me. I was holdin’ your hand an’ the next thing I knew, I was in Angel’s office standin’ in the middle of his sodding desk. An’ I did wanna get to you, luv. More than anythin’. Tried leavin’ several times, but that li’l medallion that made me a champion kept pullin’ me back. Guess I was Wolfram an’ Hart collateral. Din’t rightly matter. The longer I was there, the more my mind started playin’ the guilt game on me. An’ once I was back in the flesh, goin’ to you seemed like the most unfair thing to do.” He sighed, his treacherous hand finding hers. Needing to feel her, despite what his cautious mind forewarned. “It kills me to think of you with anyone else. An’ yeh, I’m a hypocrite. ‘S what I wanted for you when you ran out of the cave. A chance to live an’ all that. I was happy to give it to you…I jus’ got the wrong end, ‘cause it din’t last. As for the other, I knew it was inevitable, but doesn’ mean I…” He smiled when she grinned at him shyly. “I guess when I figured out who you had moved on to, somethin’ snapped. It hurt…because of everythin’. ‘m still angry as hell, but that doesn’ mean you deserved some of the things I said. I know you’re…you grew up from that, Buffy. I jus’…I figured you’d wanna be with someone who…”
“Wouldn’t hurt me?”
He nodded. She smiled.
“Wasn’t it you who always said I needed a little monster in my man?”
“What you got with me was more than a li’l monster, luv.”
“That wasn’t your fault. But god, I don’t wanna play the blame game.” A long sigh passed through her throat, and she shook her head, leaning back. “You said we were beyond ‘sorry’s.’ I want to be beyond them. Very, very beyond them. I don’t know what I expected coming here…but yeah, major Buffy presumption in thinking that we could magically work everything out.”
“I wish we could.”
A watery smile crossed her face. “So do I.”
An uncomfortable beat past between them, screaming all the things that remained unsaid. Everything that was yet unaccounted for.
“I meant it, you know.”
Spike perked a brow, shifting slightly against the hospital pillow. “Meant it?”
“You didn’t believe me…and yeah, that pissed me off, but I understand why you didn’t. I just think it’s important that you know I meant it.” The Cockney froze palpably, mind racing as his eyes went as large as saucers. There was no doubting to what she was referring—no doubting, and yet a part of him needed suddenly to hear the words with more desperation than anything he had ever experienced.
It was unfair, of course. To demand her love after everything that had occurred.
But God, he hadn’t changed so radically, had he? This was what he wanted.
“I had a lot of time to make it right,” she continued, playing ignorance on part of his reaction. “That’s one of my biggest regrets. I could’ve told you that night in the house. You know?”
A hard swallow. “Yeh.” He thought of that night so often. Played out its conclusion a thousand different ways, even if what had transpired between them remained one of the singular most revolutionary events in all his years.
And before he knew what he was doing, his mouth fell open and he bowed again to the turn of a branch that kept on breaking beneath him.
One last time. If only one last time…
“I meant it, too.”
She sat up slowly and looked at him.
“What I told you that night. Everythin’. It hasn’ changed.” He smiled lightly. “Still remains the best bloody night of my life. Don’ think anything’ll change that.”
The air around them grew tight. Constrictive. It was so strange—he remembered the way it felt, falling all those times before. Watching seasons change in her eyes before she even knew to keep up. And there were so many things to say, so many that had remained unsaid. Things she deserved to know. His own imposed distance between them was broken, and on some level, he had known it couldn’t last.
A familiar pain was rising in his chest.
He loved her too much to give her up. Despite how she hurt him; and he wasn’t thrilled by what that made him, but for the impossible affection of one woman, he would sacrifice anything.
And he hurt her, too. That knowledge killed him. Seemed they couldn’t take one step without destroying each other.
Things had changed, though. So much had changed. She wasn’t the empty shell of a woman that resolved her issues by making him the issue, and his own hostility aside; she hadn’t been for a while. Last year had seen developments that took what they had and placed it above levels of intimacy. Sharing himself with someone he didn’t deserve in ways he had never imagined. But that was last year and things were different now.
They had grown apart in alike ways.
And of course, there were some things that were worth it and always would be.
At some point, he had covered the space between them. She was so close; he could hear her heart thudding against him. Pounding. Her eyes were large and the scent of fresh tears encircled her with poignant repose. Buffy looked at him for a long, studious moment, and finally shook her head before emotion could cloud her again. “Is there no way to fix this?”
And that was it. No more pretending. No more guarding himself behind self-imposed shields. He loved her with everything he was, and he wasn’t going to deny himself that any longer.
It hurt.
“I meant what I said that night,” Spike whispered. “I love you, Buffy. I think I always have…in one way, or another.”
The emotion storming her eyes threatened to overflow. “Oh God, I love you, too. And I’m sorry.” Her voice cracked and she glanced down; there was nothing that struck him quite as deeply as the sight of her grief. “I’m so sorry for everything. For making you believe that it…your soul meant nothing to me. It meant the world.”
He nodded, because he believed her. “I know, luv. I’m sorry for that. Sorry for a lot of things.” A long breath hissed through his teeth. “’ve been a git.”
“You earned it.”
“There’s a lot to work through, here.”
“I know. Oh God, I know.” Her face threatened to crumple again. “But I wanna try. Please, Spike, can we try?”
That was it. The rest of his resistance fell to the wayside, and he pulled her to him, crushing her against his chest and burying his nose in her hair. “Yes. God, yes. I never wanted anythin’ else.” He pulled back just a bit, smiling through his own tears, and kissed her softly with reassurance. “I was…earlier—”
“He…I needed to prove to myself that I had changed.”
“You have.” Spike smiled delicately and cupped her face, pressing his lips to her forehead. “We both have.” A sigh tumbled through his lips. “I’ve crossed the world for you more times than I can count, sweetheart,” he murmured. “I was a wanker to think I’d ever do anythin’ but.”
Buffy pulled back only slightly, resting her brow against his as she nodded. “We’ll work this out?”
A grin tickled his lips. “We’re both as hardheaded as they come.”
“I’m not too late?”
“I’m surprised I even managed to let you think that.” Spike kissed her cheek reverently. “There’s never too late with us. I thought there was once, but you turned my world upside down on it. You’ve forgiven me for so much. More than I reckon I deserve.”
“You, too.” Buffy attempted a smile but couldn’t quite make it. “I just want the hurt to be in the past. There’s been so much hurt…I just…”
“’m not goin’ anywhere.”
“Promise?”
There was a significant pause at that; he released a quaking breath and met her eyes again for the satisfaction of his word. There would be no leaving again. No bursting into flames, no more sucker-punches and name-calling. No more of anything that stopped them before. Whatever happened in the future would be new. There would undoubtedly be tears and anger and arguments and things said that they wished they could take back. But there would be no more running. Not from this. Not from either one of them.
To turn away now would cost him every sense of self. He was a fool, even for a second, to think it otherwise.
“Promise.”
And there it was. A smile he had conquered worlds for in a time that didn’t seem so long ago. The same that haunted his dreams and greeted him upon every awakening. The same he had sacrificed himself for time and time again, because once was never enough. A million times later could never be enough.
Something arose within him. There were still worlds out there to conquer.
And he would find them. Every last one.
If it meant he could keep her.