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Author's Chapter Notes:
This is the chapter where it all starts to make sense.
Spike liked a crowded bar on a Saturday night. He liked the way people wore their need on their faces, especially the women who illustrated their hopes in dark eye shadows and lipsticks. They wanted to have a good time, forget the week, maybe fall in love for a few hours; he’d come to places like this for the very same reasons and he liked knowing he was not alone. He liked that even though it was snowing outside, in the bar the exposed skin and vividly colored clothes made it feel like summer. All that hunger on display made him feel alive.

He and Tara were in a tiny, hole-in-the wall bar in Polish Hill. That section of town looked like Prague at night, or the way Spike imagined Prague would look being that he'd never been there. The cobblestone streets were narrow, the hills steep, and the buildings were crammed together like books on a shelf. They'd had to creep through a narrow alley to get into the place, a detail he'd enjoyed in spite of himself.

Toy had left him late in the afternoon after he’d made good on his promise to make the next time perfect for her. She told him that had, and the time after that, too. Spike had invited Toy to join him at the bar so that she could meet his friends, but she said she had to work.

When he pressed her on details about her job, Toy said she was an independent contractor, which made him wonder if she might be a stripper.

He was almost glad Toy had not come. He and Tara were finally meeting Charlie's girlfriend, or they were supposed to be, if either of them would show. It would be a lot of pressure, and he didn’t want to scare Toy away.

Tara was nursing her Diet Coke and Spike was on his third vodka tonic. Vodka was his diet liquor because it had fewer calories than whiskey, so he could drink more when he was in training mode. They were leaning against the Persian-rug clad walls in the packed back room waiting for the pool table to open up. A skinny brunette with a thick fringe of bangs brushed past Spike for the third time that night. She was casting him a sidelong glance from behind her tortoise shell glasses. She was holding two drinks, one for herself and one for her little, red-haired friend who was seated in a booth that could have easily been accessed without detouring past him. Spike put his hands around Tara's waist and spoke into her ear over the loud music.

“Laugh and touch my stomach,” he said.

Tara threw her head back and let out a husky laugh. Then she let her palm fall just above his belly button. The brunette blushed and ran back to her friend, not bothering to look back.

“What was wrong with her?” Tara asked.

He almost said he was seeing someone, but didn't want to have another conversation with Tara about how his precious Toy could be a supernatural menace.

“Not my type,” he said, as he tipped back his glass.

“You're s,s,still letting t,t,that nutter use you for a s,s,semen A.T., T., T.M., aren't you?” Tara asked.

Just then Charlie and his date, Fred, came in. She was a slim, tall girl with a cascade of loose, brown curls that fell to the small of her back. Fred had enormous eyes and delicate features that would’ve suited a cameo necklace.

“Don't talk about it in front of them, love,” Spike said to Tara. She gave him a sloe-eyed look, one that told him he was getting only a brief respite from her questions.

Fred was different than Spike had pictured. He'd imagined someone more glamorous, somebody more Charlie. His best friend always dressed impeccably in elegant suits. He looked more like a lawyer than a boxer. Fred had a bit of a country twang about her flowered sundress.

“Sorry we're late, we had to stop for tacos,” Charlie said.

Then Charlie and Fred giggled like they were a couple of drunk middle-school girls. Spike had never heard his friend make a sound remotely approaching a giggle before and it became clear in that instant why Charlie was so crazy about his girl. They were both silly in the same way.

After introductions were made and drinks were passed around, Spike slipped away into the crowd to relish the anonymous crush of bodies against him. Some local band was playing and the people around him were churning in time with the music. The little red-haired girl who'd been sitting with the flirtatious brunette was staring at him from across the room. Her eyes were green and the way the colored lights were flashing on her face reminded him of the first night he'd had with Toy. The red-head was nearing; her eyes seemed to shine like a cat's and her gaze made his skin prickle with heat. Suddenly she was a hair's breadth away and holding onto the sleeve of his black shirt. For some reason he didn’t shake her off the way he normally would.

“Hey,” she said.

“What happened to your little pal?” Spike asked. The red-head was wearing a glossy, black leather corset and matching skirt. It was exactly the type of thing he found sexy and it made her stand out from the rest of the crowd, yet there was something about her that was repellant to Spike.

“She got sleepy, and you just got something a whole lot better. You wanna get out of here?” she asked with a half smile. Her thin, quirky lips were painted black.

“Sorry, love, I'm spoken for,” Spike said.

“That's too bad, you've got such pretty, blue eyes,” she said, with an inky pout.

Spike was about to say something clever, but then he couldn’t remember what it was. She was closing in on him, but he couldn’t pull away, he couldn’t speak. Just like a nightmare, he could not move. The red-head was kissing him, forcing her cold, slimy tongue in between his slightly parted, immobile lips. She was touching him, too, sliding her hand under his shirt until her palm was resting over his heart.

“You still taste like her. I thought I caught her scent outside, but it must've been you, bright eyes,” she said conversationally, as though he'd have any idea what she meant, as though she weren’t violating him on the most basic level. He wanted to recoil, to speak, but it wouldn't come.

“I love the way your heart's pounding. It's like a little bird trapped in my hand. Can't wait to get a better look in there,” she said with a grin as she tapped a sharp nail against his chest.

Then they were walking, shoving past people, he saw Tara's confused face and wanted to call out to her but suddenly he was outside. They were standing in the cramped alley that led to the bar. The back of his head was banging against a brick wall, he was shivering and his boots were crinkling in the snow.

The red-head's face was close to his and it was all wrong; ridges were popping out on her forehead and her teeth were monstrous, sharp.

“Tell me where she is, bright eyes, so I can tell my daddy.”

Her nails were digging into his flesh like knives. Something wet was sliding down his stomach and words were forming on her death-colored lips. Her red hair was glowing in the neon light of the bar. Then he heard a familiar voice.

“She's right behind you.”

The red-head turned to dust and crumbled right in front of him, but she couldn't have because that was impossible. Toy was looking at him from behind the cloud of vapor.

“Toy?” he asked.

Spike was falling and strong arms were catching him. Toy was holding him, she was warm and above her head the moon was a pearl button sewn into a cloudy, velvet sky.

“I love you,” she said.

For some reason hearing her say she loved him made it safe to close his eyes.

**

Spike woke up in a room he’d never been in before. He was fairly certain he was in a hospital; the bed had railings, a bag of intravenous fluids was dripping into his arm and behind a white, blue spotted curtain that was separating his portion of the room from the rest, someone was hacking out his lungs. Spike was wearing a blue, cotton hospital gown. His chest was sore and the bandage over it was itchy.

For the first time since he woke, Spike realized he was alone and he felt an intense fear that something had happened to Tara or Toy. He flung one of his legs over the edge of the bed and stood up. Just then, his sister walked into the room carrying a cup of coffee.

“Billy!” she said. Then she was a flutter of skirts hurtling toward him and knocking Spike back on the bed. She sloshed lukewarm coffee on his shoulder, but he decided not to mention it.

“I was s,s,so s,s,scared. Do you remember what happened?”
“Bits and pieces, love,” Spike said, trying not to wince as she put pressure on his injury.

Tara loosened her embrace; she set the coffee on the stand beside his bed and held his hands.

“Charlie found you in a s,s,snow drift. Your wallet was gone, the police found it in the street a few blocks away. They t,t,think s,s,somebody s,s,stabbed you and t,t,took it. I t,t,told them about the Queen of t,t,the Damned you left with,” Tara said. Her thumb was tracing out circles on his and her hands wouldn't stop shaking.

“Truer words, love. I think she had GHB in her lip gloss. Did he follow me out?” he asked.

“No, I just got t,t,this feeling s,s,something was wrong, s,s,so we looked for you outside, ” Tara said.

“Was there anybody with me?”

“He said you were alone,” Tara said.

Spike's first thought was that Toy had abandoned him in a pile of snow to die. Some sane part of his brain was hoping the whole incident had been a hallucination. He was certain if he told the police what happened, he’d be committed. Still, if there was anyone who would believe that his assailant had dissolved in front of his eyes, it was Tara, but Spike wasn't ready to tell her yet. He had to see his girl.


Chapter End Notes:
Please review--I'm in need of some constructive criticism.



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