He pushed her against the back of the mirror, a tiny groan escaping his lips as she let out a small, unintentional mewl. Buffy’s fingers wove into his hair, the candy she’d held was long forgotten and on the floor. She held him to her the same way he was holding her.
Her breathing was ragged, but the kiss grew in heat and speed, and she found she couldn’t inhale at all as their lips stayed connected for much longer. Mouths fused together, she felt everything spinning out of control. Her arms were shaking, her toes barely touched the ground as Spike’s arm held her close and tight, his body pinning hers to the solid back of the mirror.
But it wasn’t quite so solid. Buffy gasped as her lips came away from Spike’s, her body falling backward when the mirror scraped against the floor, finally sliding due to the force Spike and she had pushed against it.
He caught her easily enough, simply pulling her back to him when she was about to slip away. Buffy wasn’t sure if he even realized the mirror had moved and wasn’t just reacting to her leaving him.
She found herself breathing heavily, looking at the black cotton covered chest she was pressed against. Spike was breathing just as hard, his gasps of air tickling her hair as he fought to come back to himself. They were both enveloped in each other’s arms. Buffy’s had come down to hug his waist as he held her with his hand still on the back of her head and her waist wrapped up securely.
The girl chanced a glance up at him through her lashes, turning away just as he looked down.
Buffy felt his eyes on her for a full minute before she finally had her breathing under control and could think again. It took longer to calm down when he was staring at her.
Spike swallowed hard. He didn’t know what to do now. He knew what he wanted to do, his body was screaming at him everything he craved. He wanted to lift her up and carry her downstairs to the nearest bed or soft surface. He wanted to taste her on his tongue, feel her shuddering, kiss every delectable inch of her body, lick and suckle the soft nipples on her breasts as she writhed beneath him. He wanted to bury himself deep inside her heat, feel the tight walls pulsing around his cock as he took possession of her body and marked her as his own. He wanted to sink his fangs into her throat as she climaxed for him, murmuring or screaming out his name. He wanted to know.
He wanted to find the places of her body that were most sensitive, know if she’d like it more with his fingers inside her or his tongue as he ate her out. He wanted to kiss her mouth and feel her lips wrapped around his length, wanted to make love to her body. He wanted to get lost in her. For them to get lost in each other.
But he knew, somehow he knew, that she wasn’t ready for that. Something told him today was not going to be the day when he could hold her and touch her without physical barriers, feel her naked flesh beneath his as they connected in the most intimate and primal of ways.
With a hard and yet quiet gulp, Spike chanced lowering his head and nuzzling his nose into her sweet smelling hair, surrendering to the urge he’d had for the last few minutes. It was like rain and sunshine in one, the scent from the autumn storm mixed in with a feminine shampoo and that little something that was uniquely Buffy. His Buffy.
Spike wasn’t sure how she would react to knowing that he already considered her his, but he was willing to work hard to get her to want to be. He knew she wanted him, felt and scented her desire as she’d kissed him with a fervor matching his own. She burned him alive she did.
Spike nearly felt his heart beat when Buffy’s grip tightened, hugging him closer.
He breathed her in again, loving the feel of her body against his. God she was so small, felt fragile like a baby bird. He didn’t know how he could get this to work. With what he was, what she was. He had no bloody clue.
But Spike was never one to give up easily, not when he saw something he wanted.
><
He felt so right in her arms, like they fit together. She felt safe here, she felt cared for, liked. There was no question that she had feelings for this man, but she didn’t know how she was going to go about them. Especially now.
Buffy exhaled slowly, the whole reality of the moment finally hitting her. It was one thing to spend time with him and look from afar, let her feelings grow as she steadily ignored them. She could do that. She was good at the denial thing, but now it wouldn’t be so easy.
They’d kissed. Not just a peck or a friendly hello on the cheek. It was a full blown make out session, with heat and blood rushing and the proverbial fireworks. She’d never been touched and ignited at the same time. No other guy’s hands had skimmed lightning paths across her skin, through her clothes she might add.
God she didn’t know what to do, but she realized she didn’t want to stop holding him. She didn’t want to let him go. It was attraction, and need, and fire. Feelings. Strong ones. She wasn’t going to run away from this… She just had to keep reminding herself of that resolve.
Or she could get out now before things got any worse, before she fell in deeper.
No. Then she’d be totally alone. Not only did she like Spike, felt tingles along her body when he looked at her just before smashing his mouth against her own, but she needed him. He was the only person who quieted the pain in her life, the sorrow in her heart. She didn’t want to let that go.
But now after the kiss, there was no way simple friendship could just take over again. She couldn’t hide her feelings, she wasn’t wired that way. It was either cut him out completely or make a try for something she was terrified to even think about.
She wanted him. God but she wanted him badly, and the idea of losing him just as a companion whom she could talk to was enough incentive to stop her from running away with her vulnerability and her heart securely encaged.
Buffy hugged him tighter when he nuzzled her hair. She didn’t want to lose any of this.
“Haven’ been breathless in a while,” Spike murmured wryly. “Could snog you all day, love.”
“Snog?” Thank God for funny British words. This would surely break any awkward kissage aftermath. “I assume that means…”
“What we just did.”
“You mean kiss?”
“That is what we just did, innit it?”
“Yes,” she nodded, biting her lip as she looked back down at his chest. Still wrapped up in each other. “We just kissed.”
“We kissed,” he agreed. A moment passed before he couldn’t help but ask, “How do you feel ‘bout that?”
Okay so maybe awkward aftermath was inevitable. “Honestly, I don’t know.”
He shook his head, causing her to look up at him. “Yes, you do.”
Buffy frowned. “If I say I don’t know then-”
“You’re lying,” he interjected. “Tell me what you felt. Don’t act like you’re all confused here, Buffy. I know you’ve got stuff bouncin around in that head f’yours.”
He rarely used her name, and while it sent a shiver up Buffy’s spine, she still felt annoyed by his interrogation. Why MUST she tell him what was going through her mind? It was her mind wasn’t it? “You’re not me. And while maybe YOU have all of your thoughts figured out and alphabetized, not everyone is quite so organized. Give me some time.”
She put her hands on her hips. She was getting defensive which either meant he was right, or dead wrong.
He decided he was right. “You know you feel something here, Buffy, and I wanna know what it is.” Spike spoke clearly, his voice a deep timbre as he pierced her eyes with his own. “I’ll tell you what I’m feelin.”
She glared at him. Why was he pushing her? It wasn’t like she was going to throw him out. True, she’d come very close to running away and closing herself off, but ultimately she’d decided against it. Did he really think she’d still be here talking to him if she wanted to shut him out? “Even if you spill your guts, Spike, it doesn’t mean I’m going to be able to-”
“I want to kiss you again,” he interrupted her once more, hoping to get her to listen and let go, to open up if she realized that she wasn’t alone in anything with him. “I want to kiss you for as long as I possibly can. I want to taste your skin.” He took a step closer.
Okay she was having trouble breathing again. He was getting closer, his gaze no less intense as it flitted over her blushing face. “I wanna hold you against me and feel your breath on my throat, your fingers runnin through my hair just like they were doin not five minutes ago. I want you Buffy, and I don’t just mean your body.”
She gulped inaudibly, her mouth was suddenly dry, and her eyelids felt heavy as she moved her hands to his forearms again. She wasn’t in control of anything. Seriously, her brain wasn’t the thing directing her movements right now.
Though, her brain was kind of mushy at the moment.
“I want to hold you close and watch you sleep,” he bent closer to her neck, breathing in her scent like it was the only thing keeping him alive. Like it was the only aroma he could detect, and basically it was, he was drowning in her. “I want to kiss you when you’re upset, I want to hug you in public and carry you to bed when you’re tired. I want to keep you… close.”
Buffy closed her eyes, fighting with her vulnerability as best she could.
“Very close...”
“I want that, too,” she murmured, all of her pride replaced by courage, though it felt like fear was the heaviest emotion right now. “I- I… When I kissed you, I felt… I don’t know, complete. It was… it was just-…”
Spike brushed her hair with his palm, smoothing it down in an attempt to calm her. Comfort her. “I know. Believe me Goldilocks, I know.”
Buffy’s face was burrowed into his chest, and suddenly she let out a little sound of amusement. Spike’s eyebrow quirked and he frowned down at the head of blonde hair. “What’s so funny?”
She shook her head against him. “‘Goldilocks.’ What IS it with you and nicknames anyway?”
“Like I said before, s’just a thing we Brits do… At least I do. And some f’the nicks just tend to fit you well.”
She pulled her face away from his T-shirt then, looking up into his eyes with a soft smile. He was glad to see some tease in her eyes, signaling that she was no longer so upset. “And ‘Goldilocks’ fits me?”
Spike smiled down at her, his fingers running through her hair. She seemed to lean into his touch without realizing it, and her face relaxed. He nodded. “I’d say so.”
“What other names do you think ‘fit me’?”
He frowned for a moment, then smirked. “Well... I’ve got one other. Though m’not sure you’ll like it.”
“Okay spill, I wanna know what it is.”
“Alright then…” He sighed. “‘Kitten’ does always come to mind when thinkin f’you.”
Buffy made a funny face, her nose scrunching even as her smile turned into a full-fledged grin. “‘Kitten?’ Really? How come?”
Spike shrugged a little sheepishly. “Don’t know. You just remind me of one, I guess. The way you always curl up on that couch at the library for instance,” he suggested, with a swirl of his finger imitating her supposed ‘curling up’. “You just look…” He laughed shortly. “Don’t know, ‘kitten’ just sort’ve fits you s’all.”
A beat.
“How come you never called me it before, then?”
He looked away from her, staring off into the shadowy attic. “It’s uh… It’s sort of a personal nick, love. Something I’d call someone who’s… who’s more ‘an just a friend. Wasn’ sure you’d…”
A long moment of silence filled the space, and finally Spike dared looking back at Buffy. She was chewing on her lip, and Christ but he wanted to nibble it for her. He wondered what she was going to say to his admission, if she said anything. Would she let it go? Scoff? Go back on what she’d said about wanting what he wanted and tell him to leave? He was terrified, and it unsettled him how much he wanted to hear her say-
“You can call me that.”
Spike blinked.
Buffy tried to pretend she didn’t notice the expression of sudden wonder on his face, her cheeks were hot and she was looking down. Her fingers came up to play with an invisible piece of lint on his cotton T and she swallowed to try and moisten her mouth. God she wished he would just say something.
Instead he leaned down and left an unexpected kiss on her temple, and she felt a smile against her skin.
The abrupt noise of a cuckoo clock in the corner sounding the hour broke the atmosphere. Tension slowly dissipated, and Spike and Buffy separated from each other’s arms, but they remained close.
The Brit glared at the clock before he started looking around the attic, and Buffy watched him as he seemed to get this curious look on his face. She stood up on her tippy toes to pull a string and the attic was immersed in light. “You can look around if you want. This place is full of cool old stuff.”
Spike glanced sardonically up at the light bulb above his head and smiled before walking towards a wardrobe. “What kinda stuff?”
Buffy frowned a little when she caught the look he gave the light. What, did he think he didn’t need it or something? Could he see in the dark?
With an inner eye roll Buffy shrugged it off and moved closer to her… her what? What was he to her now?
Oh wow she SO did not want to go down that road right now.
“Lots of things. Random pictures, some old clothes, glassware. Lots of… stuff,” she answered, and moved closer to Spike as he opened the old wardrobe.
He pulled out a dress and held it up to examine. Then he heard Buffy’s breath catch, and Spike looked up to see her staring at the dress with clear longing on her face.
He gently folded the garment over his arm. “You ever try it on, pet?”
Buffy shook her head but she wasn’t really aware that she did. How had she missed that dress before? It was beautiful. Long and creamy white. Encased in plastic and made out of a soft looking chiffon. The neckline was thick and drapey, and a high belt of white silk was wrapped around the bodice. The skirt looked like an A-line style that turned freely flowing and delicate as it met the floor. When Spike turned the garment over it was revealed that the drapery in the front went completely around and hung low, stopping to expose the wearer’s upper back.
A zipper sounded.
Buffy’s eyes shot up to Spike’s as he started opening the plastic garment bag, obviously planning to take the dress out.
Buffy gasped and moved forward quickly, putting her hands on his wrists. “What are you doing?”
“Takin it out so you can try it on,” he said matter-of-factly.
Buffy shook her head again. “No. You can’t, it has to be my grandmother’s, I don’t want to wreck it.”
Spike just looked at her. “Will she care if you try it on?”
“W-Well… I don’t think so, but-”
“Then you’re tryin it on.” He unzipped the bag fully, carefully extracting the delicate dress. “It looks like it’ll fit you, love.”
She looked down, glancing unintentionally at the beautiful neckline. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
She didn’t respond.
He rolled his eyes. “Do you REALLY think anything’s gonna happen to it, Buffy?”
She chewed her lip, clenching her hands at her sides to avoid reaching out to touch the fabric of the white chiffon. “Spike, w-what if-”
“What if what?”
She sighed. She was nervous to try it on in front of him, that’s what. She was nervous about what he would think.
She wanted to try the dress on, but what if it looked terrible? What if it didn’t fit or- God forbid -what if she damaged it. Broke the zipper or tore the skirt? How could she explain that to Grams?
“Buffy.”
She looked up at him and met his eyes. His gaze was gentle, probing, encouraging. He smiled slightly and pushed the dress towards her.
Buffy sighed and took the garment into her hands, holding it protectively against her chest as she looked around the attic.
“There,” he pointed to an old folding screen a few feet away. There was a hole in one panel to the far left, but other than that and some water stains, the screen was fine and would give Buffy privacy to change. “You can try it on behind there.”
She nodded and walked away from him, ducking behind the screen only to poke her head out a second later. “Keep your eyes closed ‘til I tell you to open them,” she said sternly.
Spike rolled said eyes. “Fine.”
Buffy nodded and then went back behind the screen.
><
Spike clenched his jaw when he heard the sounds of rustling fabric. It was so low that he wouldn’t have caught any sound at all if he weren’t a vampire.
But he was, and the quiet noise of clothes dragging across skin just added to the difficulty he had with holding onto control. Buffy was stripping not fifteen feet away from him, and it was torture.
He walked over to a three legged table, examining it to try and curb his disobedient thoughts. The wood was dark mahogany and the surface, though coated in dust, was smooth and cool to the touch. It looked like a coffee table, but it was a little tall. There was a bookcase not far away hiding in a corner. It was bare, the bottom shelf falling off and the paint chipping.
Spike was mentally assessing what he could do to fix the thing when he heard a zipper.
He gritted his teeth.
All the images he’d just been about to get a hold on danced through his brain, little fantasies starting up that would no doubt demand to be finished later. He saw Buffy with her back bare, the slender curve of her spine and the smoothness of her naked skin tempting his fingers. Her round bottom raised in the air, waiting for his touch. His girl laid out on his bed, her chest heaving and the little pink rosebuds on her chest teasing him until he bent down for a taste.
Spike groaned.
Damned torturous imagination.
Why had he told her to try the bloody dress on?
A throat clearing from behind him caught his attention and he turned around.
*Bloody hell.* That’s why.
She’d snuck up on him, and evidently made it to the mirror before Spike could even think to look behind him. Now Buffy stood in front of the aged foggy glass with a light blush on her cheeks.
She looked like an angel. The dress didn’t just fit her perfectly, but looked like it was made for her. The soft white offset the strawberry blonde highlights in her hair, her green eyes popped vibrantly and the fabric flowed around her legs like water. She glanced down, holding out the ends of the skirt as she turned to reveal her half bare back to his eyes. The draped material hung low and exposed smooth skin. The dress fit exquisitely around every curve, and Buffy looked like what Spike would have imagined a magical fairy princess to look like back when he was a little boy.
“Spike? What do you think?”
He couldn’t even blink, let alone think. His eyes were riveted on her. He’d never seen someone as stunning. She was angelic. The dress made her look delicate and innocent, beautiful.
“Spike?” She was frowning, nerves all over her face as she took a double take in the mirror.
Silly chit, didn’t she know she was breathtaking?
“You look beautiful, love.” No, that was NOT his bleeding voice choking on the last word.
Her teeth showed luminously and she looked down at the gown again. Spike could’ve sworn his heart started beating.
*I have to have her.*
He smiled when she grinned at him, quickly twirling around in the dress like a little girl.
“Thank you,” she said to his earlier compliment. “You know I think this might have been my great aunt’s wedding dress, actually.”
Spike tilted his head, his eyes still fixed on her as she moved to-and-fro in front of the mirror. “Yeah?”
She nodded. “Yeah. My Grams’ sister, Mary. I never met her before she died, but Grams showed me some pictures and I think I saw her wearing this.”
“Don’ think it could’ve looked this good on anyone else to tell ya the truth, love.”
She met his stare.
Spike raked his eyes over her, a touch of both awe and lust in his gaze. “You’re bloody gorgeous.”
She blushed from head to toe, and Spike grinned at the sight.
“Thanks… I just wish I could wear it someplace.”
Spike’s brows knit together. “M’sure your Grams wouldn’t mind you borrowin it.”
“No it’s not that,” she replied. “I just really have nowhere to wear it.”
Spike took a couple of steps forward, reaching out to finger the delicate material of the gown. He didn’t notice Buffy’s intake of breath at his approach. “Looks like your Grams kept it in good shape all these years. I’d wager you could find someplace ta wear it.”
Buffy pressed her lips together. “Maybe.” She shrugged and then sighed, planning to get out of this garment and stop her forlorn thoughts. Before she could walk back behind the folding screen Spike caught her hand.
She gave him a questioning look in response and he pulled her closer, leaving a tender kiss on her temple before squeezing her warm fingers in his cold ones. “You’ll get to wear it someday, pet. Count on it.”
Pulling away and trying not to let her emotions show, her heartbeat racing, Buffy looked up at him. She didn’t smile, and she didn’t say anything, but her expression was both grateful and hopeful, warm.
Spike let her walk over to the screen to get changed, all the while wondering how he might be able to make it so she could wear that dress.
><
When Buffy came back out from behind the folding screen she saw Spike sitting on the floor a few feet away. He was cross-legged and looking over something. She walked to the wardrobe from where the dress had been taken and started putting it back inside its plastic garment bag before she asked him what he was looking at.
“Just some photos, love.” He turned to face her, a few random pictures in his hands. “Hope that’s alright?”
Buffy’s heart plummeted.
He couldn’t be looking at… No. Not the pictures.
She froze, her hand stilled over the just re-hung dress inside the wardrobe.
“These of you an your mum, pet?”
Buffy swallowed, a severe need to run away from the attic started to consume her at a pace that was almost as frightening as the past she fought so hard to ignore. The pictures were taunting, hateful, bitter memories that had the power to make her insides virtually collapse. They’d broken her all over again not a week ago.
She didn’t want to go near them.
“Buffy?”
She didn’t answer. How could she? Buffy’s chest was burning, and her eyes were rimmed with thin layers of tears just ready to shatter like glass against her cheeks. The past and all she tried so hard to hide from was not five feet away, sitting in an unmarked box and in the hands of a man she’d come to trust. Spike wasn’t supposed to be near her history like this.
“What’s wrong?” He asked, having felt the shift in the air. The pressure pushed darkly against his body, Spike felt unease enfold them both like a thin cloak. He was frowning, his face a canvas of concern as he stared at Buffy’s. She reminded him of a scared deer ready to run from a predator. What had happened in between the space of a second? Her heartbeat was rapid beneath her chest, and she gulped before practically whispering, “Can you put those away.”
It wasn’t a question, but more of a command. Spike squinted, his mind spinning to try and figure out what… Wait.
Instinctively he looked to the cardboard box brimming with pictures, and then he realized something. It was like the urgent sound of a bell going off. Small facts came back to him, the locket Buffy wore, she told him she’d moved in with her grandmother, she never spoke of any other family asides from telling him that the necklace she always had on was once her mother’s… The darkening of her light… Could these pictures get her to open up?
Spike decided to try something.
He didn’t know how well this would work, but…
She heard him stand, and the almost indiscernible brush of photographs between his fingers.
She hadn’t moved once, and before Buffy realized it he was right next to her with an old picture in his left hand. He put an arm around her waist.
He bent his head a little and looked into her eyes. There were shimmering tears there, ready to pour, and he felt a protective instinct overwhelm him.
He held the picture out to her as if displaying a crystal object to a young child who would have to be delicate with it. Except in this case, Spike felt the delicate object wasn’t the photograph.
“This your mum?” he asked.
He hated the choking noise he didn’t hear. Buffy made a movement with her throat that seemed to require a heartbreaking sound attached, but there was none. Just absolute silence.
It was the coldest quiet he’d ever heard.
Spike hated himself for pushing her, but he needed to get through. Buffy couldn’t let go of anything without feeling a little pain… or a lot; but he would be there to hold her. Maybe she just needed to realize that.
He looked back down at the picture. It had a lovely woman who looked to be in her late twenties, holding up a smiling little girl with the cutest nose Spike could pinpoint anywhere. That was Buffy when she was about three he’d guess, and he presumed the woman holding her was her mother. They looked alike, Buffy’s mum was beautiful just like her daughter, and they had the same smile. Spike just wished Buffy would answer his question.
“She’s wearin’ the locket you’ve got ‘round your neck,” he stated, remembering when she’d told him it belonged to her mother. He knew very well his hunch was right, but he wanted Buffy to tell him.
Though she looked like if she uttered a single word she’d break.
Spike swore his chest clenched when Buffy nodded her head without blinking or even looking down at the photograph.
But then she did, and an inaudible breath was taken in as a tear slipped down her cheek.
Spike didn’t want to, but he spoke again anyway. He knew why now. God he knew so much. A tiny guess had turned into full blown truth in the space of a few hours, and now he knew- he KNEW –why Buffy was always closed off. Why she was darkened by pain, the pain lie right here in his hands. Something happened to her family, at least definitely, to her mother. So he spoke again, as much as he loathed to hurt Buffy. “What happened to her?”
Her knees gave out. Spike fell with her only because he needed to catch her, and then he lowered them both down to the dusty ground. Her throat, once dry and tight, now choked her completely and made the most horrible sounds she’d believed she’d ever made. Her tears finally cascaded down her cheeks, past her chin, soaking the material of Spike’s shirt where her face was burrowed.
His arms wrapped around her protectively, holding her face against him as she sobbed. Her cries were muffled but strong, he felt the vibrations of them with every shake of her body. She sounded like a broken child and she wept without pause, Spike was sure, for everything she hadn’t yet dared to cry for. She was clutching him so tight and pinching the material of his shirt that he was sure she’d rip it. He only held tighter.
><
They sat like that for who knew how long. Buffy cried, she sobbed and coughed and sniffled pathetically and hated herself for every second of it. She loathed crying and had no right to unload all of this off on Spike. She didn’t.
But then he told her the opposite.
He shushed her, he sat on the old creaky wooden floor of her Grams’ attic and he held her tightly, anything or one that dared to threaten her at that moment was sure to feel Spike’s wrath. He looked into her eyes when the shuddering, breath stealing sobs had weakened to a steady leak of tears. He made her talk to him, just as he made her accept his comfort.
She’d relayed the story. Her whole life story. Her past, the bitter and not at all sweet memories because they were gone spilled forth on her tongue, and the shards of glass she felt piercing her heart were slowly removed by Spike’s hand. He listened.
She went into a detailed retelling of her years, how she’d lived in San Francisco her whole life, until now, with her mother and grandfather. How her dad had died when she was little, and after was when her grandpa had come to live with Buffy and Joyce. To help raise the little one, as well as comfort his grieving daughter.
How the death of Hank Summers had affected everyone. Buffy being so young at the time only had a handful of memories of her dad, but she still missed him. She told Spike about the trips that were made a couple of times to Grams’ when she was younger. Her life was spelled out for him.
Her school, her friends, how she’d been a popular cheerleader who had a secret penchant for reading. How it all had changed after the fire this summer following graduation.
“Grams flew out to California faster than a bat out a hell the second I called her.” She murmured between shaky breaths and tears, Spike holding her all the while. She told him about calling her beloved grandmother right after the fire, and how quickly the woman had gotten to San Francisco.
Buffy told him she’d lost her family all in one night, due to old wiring in a beautiful house that was probably once a speakeasy back in the twenties. Her home. A place that had been passed down through generations. Some uncle or cousin on her father’s side had bought the place years ago, and it had stayed in the family ever since.
Her family home was gone now, and with it her mom and Papa.
After Grams got to California, she’d grabbed the bull by the horns, taking care of everything. She’d grieved with Buffy, she’d made the funeral arrangements, and she’d opened up her home to her granddaughter immediately.
A month and a half was all it took for Grams to help Buffy handle everything that needed tending to after the fire. From money issues to nursing a loved one’s heartache as best she could.
The wills had left Buffy with everything, but “everything” consisted of a burnt down house that held a recent home equity loan, and not much money from either of her deceased guardians.
Buffy had been a wreck, barely able to hold herself up standing let alone try and understand what one did after such an incident. She didn't know how to deal with banks, insurance companies, setting up services for family to say goodbye- it was all daunting and Grams had been there to help her through it.
After the insurance company had finally come through and all else was taken care of, Buffy had insisted Grams go back to Alabama a week before she did. The girl had claimed she needed to say goodbye to friends and that she could take a bus down there on her own.
It wasn't easy to convince the older woman, but Buffy finally succeeded in getting her to agree.
“When Grams went back home, I used the time alone to just… exist, really,” she confessed to Spike, her voice quiet.
Her popularity had slowly diminished following graduation. And after the fire, all of those people who had once followed her around the school hallways, seemed to stop caring about her.
None of her friends came to the services, not even the girls she'd been with when she'd gotten the phone call that awful night.
And with each word, with every heart wrenching memory told and each breath used to relay her story and the recent past, Buffy grew more determined to get everything out. She was in so much pain it was amazing she could even talk, but finally telling someone and explaining her history was draining her of both energy and a feeling she couldn’t describe. Her tears felt like they were drying, she wasn’t just controlling them, but it felt like they were actually leaving. At least for a little while.
She was long heartbroken and her cheeks were raw, but she didn’t feel alone.
And Spike knew exactly what she was going through. In some twisted way she couldn’t understand. He said everything she never would have guessed she wanted to hear, yet after hearing it, couldn’t imagine having not. He held her through her whole story, through all the breakdowns in the middle where she cried for minutes at a time before being able to speak again. He shushed her, even kissed her lips once to try and comfort her. He watched over her like his life depended on it, like he was begging her for a smile in the midst of all this darkness. Like his happiness could only come if hers did, too.
Little did Buffy know that that was very true.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
So this one is a bit longer than normal, i hope you guys enjoy it! Please review!
Chapter End Notes:
please let me know if i described Buffy's story well, i want to make sure I described it clearly for you while still seeming like she was telling it to Spike too.
And yes, kitten is my favorite nickname so it'll be used =)
thanks for reading! *hugs*
And yes, kitten is my favorite nickname so it'll be used =)
thanks for reading! *hugs*