[Reviews - 34]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Microsoft Word Chapter or Story | ePub eBook Chapter or Story | Printer Chapter or Story

Has been viewed 3167 times

- Text Size +




Chapter 3: Unsettled

One Month Later:

Buffy wakes up, the rough underside of the rug rubs against her delicate skin and her eyes open. Greeted by the glow of soft candlelight Buffy finds herself on the floor of the lower part of Spike’s crypt, her naked and warn form rests beneath the oriental rug and Spike is fast asleep. Passed out from passion and exhaustion a few feet from her he lies under the same rug and is looking handsomely disheveled with his blonde hair in a mess of curls. Buffy sighs. Over the last month this has become somewhat of a routine, an affair. She would patrol and then end her nights here letting him take her thoughts away and ease her pain. When she came to him he could erase the stressors clouding her mind with nothing more than a touch of his chilling fingertips. That touch would send sparks flying through her every time.

Buffy scrambles to her feet and searches for her clothes, more often than not she ends up leaving sans an item or two and has started dressing for patrol in clothes she can quickly get out of. The Slayer tugs up her jeans and throws her blouse over her head then sets to buttoning said jeans, as she does, however, a sick feeling comes over her. Her belly twists and rumbles as if all her insides have suddenly knotted up. She squeezes her eyes shut for a moment willing the nausea to go away, but it doesn’t. Then with a quick intake of breath Buffy grips the ladder with her left hand and bends over letting loose her dinner from the night before.

Spike wakes at the sound of her uneasiness; he quickly rushes to the Slayer’s side and runs his hand down her back. Buffy spits in an attempt to clean out her mouth and closes her eyes feeling Spike’s chilly hand on her back. Her body suddenly feels fevered and his cool touch calms her.

“You alright pet?” Spike asks, his voice filled with concern.

“Yeah, must just be the flu… I’ll be fine.” Buffy stands up straight and turns to Spike. “I should get going, Dawn…”

“Dawn is fast asleep and will still be in four hours when the sun comes up.”

“Spike…”

“You’re burning up love,” he says resting his hand against her forehead and as he does she closes her eyes comforted by his cold skin. “Stay here,” he pleads and Buffy is about to object. “Jus’ till mornin’, then you can kick me in the head and toddle off like usual… there’s just no sense lettin’ a beasty get a swing at you when you’re not at your best.”

He runs his hand down her arm sending chilling tingles through her body and turns them toward the bed. Part of Buffy wants to leave, wants to run away, but his cold skin against her heated flesh feels so good. Buffy nods and lets Spike lead her to the bed.

She curls up under the covers leaving her clothes on and he lies down beside her. Still exhausted from their night of passion she falls asleep quickly and finds that she’s glad Spike made her stay, although she’ll never admit it.

--

Buffy’s eyes flutter open once again as sunlight shines in through the open hole leading to the lower crypt. Still hazy from sleep she shifts in bed and finds that her body is pressed up against Spike’s porcelain form. Her hand sits on his bare chest and her head is resting on his shoulder, even her leg is swung over his hip, what disturbs Buffy the most however is that the last few hours of sleep she got were the best she’s had in over a month. Buffy jumps back instantly detangling herself from the vampire. Luckily he’s still dead asleep and Buffy squirms out of bed before he has a chance to wake. She heads home just after sunrise without any of the nausea from the night before returning.

--

Buffy puts the orange juice back in the fridge and closes the door. Her eyes catch the acceptance letter which has been stuck to the fridge with a bright pink magnet. When she received that letter a month ago she had been afraid to open it. Getting back into college would help her feel like her life is somewhat normal again. Studying and working toward something would give her purpose again, and she feared that that sense of normalcy and purpose would be taken from her with just a single letter. When she opened it, however, she was delighted to find the word ‘congratulations’ at the top of the page. Now Buffy just waits and hopes that financial aid comes through with enough money for her to cover tuition costs for the fall semester. She’d like to have started back this spring, but she’d already missed the deadline.

“Dawn!” Buffy yells as she makes her way to the end of the stairs with a glass of orange juice in her hand. “Hurry up, Xander’s gonna be here any minute.”

“I’m coming!” Dawn yells back from somewhere on the second story. Buffy takes a gulp of the juice in her hand and then Dawn is trampling down the stairs.

“Here,” Buffy says holding the orange liquid out to her sister.

“Ooo juice!” Dawn replies and grabs the glass gulping down the rest of the drink. She hands the glass back to Buffy who sets it on the kitchen counter just as a horn is heard from outside. “Hurry up Buffy I’m gonna be late.” Buffy follows her sister out the front door closing it behind her and walks with her to Xander’s grey sedan.

“You’re not gonna be late, we’re right on time,” Buffy says as she gets in the passenger seat of the sedan and Dawn sits in the back.

“Well hello my two favorite ladies,” Xander says as the passenger and back door close.

“You better be careful with phrases like that, Anya might hear you,” Buffy says teasingly.

“Okay, so you’re two of my favorite ladies, either way let’s just keep that between us.”

“Anya driving you nuts?”

“It’s like wedding planning makes her extra jealous, I was zoning out at the flower shop the other day while she was talking with this lady about the boutonnieres, she asked me a question and being of the zoned I didn’t hear her, thus she concluded that I was staring at the flower lady and then asked if I thought she was prettier then her.”

“Good luck with that one.”

“Hey, Xander take me to the west side of the building today,” Dawn says. “I’ve got a bio lab and I wanna get there early.”

“No problem Dawnie,” Xander says as they get closer to the school.

Dawn’s high school, or rather middle school which was added on to a few years back when Sunnydale High went ka-boom, is a small place. Not the large gathering of student bodies that Buffy and Xander remember. Buffy hopes smaller class sizes will make keeping Dawn in line a little easier. She hopes that her little sister will make friends and get the attention and companionship that she needs there as Buffy still feels like her contribution to the social part of Dawn’s life is lacking.

She’s been trying harder lately, and it’s been easier since she’s been seeing Spike, although she won’t admit it to herself. She wants for Dawn to be happy; but Buffy still has days when she isn’t sure what she wants for herself and finds a hard time giving Dawn what she needs from a sister. Buffy finds that she needs so much herself to be happy these days that she has little to give, but at least with Spike giving her some of those needs she’s able to at least try and be a better sister then she was.

The car stops and Dawn gets out waving bye to Buffy and Xander.

--

Xander parks the car outside the Magic Box and he and Buffy get out. Since Buffy’s announcement that she was in Heaven Xander has been trying to do whatever he can to spend more time with her. And driving her to the Magic Box so she can train, even on days when he has to go to work right after dropping her off, provides them with some quality best friend time. Today, however, is Xander’s day off and he’s looking forward to spending time with the Scoobies as Anya will be working inside and Willow and Tara are here after their morning class.

The bell above the door signals their arrival and Willow and Tara look up from the table where they’re working on school assignments to smile at Buffy and Xander.

“Hey guys,” Xander says then makes his way to the counter to give Anya a kiss.

“How’s it going?” Willow asks.

“Peachy with a side of keen,” Buffy says as she sits down at the round table. The phrase doesn’t exactly explain how she feels, although she does have to admit that things seem a little better now than they were a month ago.

“D-did you hear back about your loans yet?” Tara asks, and for a moment the witch seems to stare oddly at Buffy but she quickly lowers her eyes.

“Not so much, but here’s to hoping for free money.”

“I’m sure you’ll get loans to cover everything,” Willow says and Buffy smiles.

“Well, I’ll find out soon… anyway I’m gonna go work out for a bit, shall we reconvene in an hour with donuts?”

“On it,” Xander calls out.

“Make sure you get extra jelly ones this time,” Buffy hears Willow saying as she disappears into the training room.

--

Buffy is attacking the punching bag and throwing all her energy into her training. She finds it’s easy to lose herself in activities like fighting, and while things have been getting better lately she still values the moments she has when she can focus on something so intently that the rest of the world goes away. Training, fighting, and other activities which she attempts not to think about, mostly the kind that as of lately have been involving Spike. Buffy hits the bag with a heavy punch and it nearly flies off its chain.

The Slayer takes a deep breath and has to steady the punching bag for a moment. A wave of fatigue has overcome her. She thinks that maybe her thoughts about having the flu earlier are true, although she wonders why she’s yet to have a runny nose or scratchy throat. For a while during the day Buffy had tossed her nausea up to a case of food poisoning, but now she’s starting to think that she may actually be sick.

Then with a sinking feeling of uneasiness the nausea returns and Buffy finds herself gripping her stomach. She silently prays that the feeling subsides but it doesn’t, in fact it gets worse and Buffy finds herself rushing for the door. She pushes her way out of the training room and into the small half bath in the back of the store.





You must login (register) to review.