William was tired. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so tired. It had been four days since he’d experienced the weird flashback, and he had hardly slept since. Every time he closed his eyes, images flashed through his mind; Xander, Mr. Giles, that Buffy girl, and others that he recognized, and yet didn’t know. The actual situations that he saw were the worse. Not only were they unbelievably bizarre, but it was almost like they were shrouded in a giant fog. The dreams didn’t make sense, and the ones that almost did were anything but ordinary. The dreams were filled with death, destruction, and violence. He was on the outside watching himself interact with Xander, Buffy, and the others. He was fighting, crying, and killing. It was intense and crazy, and there was no way that it could be just a coincidence. Something was definetely going on, but he couldn’t figure out what. It couldn’t be real; there was just no way that his dreams could be real. For one, monsters didn’t exist, and for another, if they did, he highly doubted that he would be fighting them. He was at his wits end. He couldn’t tell anyone, and even if he did they wouldn’t understand. William groaned. How was he supposed to work when he felt like this? Every time he picked up a hammer or even a nail, it felt like they had quadrupled in weight. William glanced down at his watch. He had an hour until lunch, but there was no way he was going to make it until then. He needed to sit down because if he didn’t, he was going to topple over. The frightening path that his life had just started down was a heavy load that was almost to much carry when you were about to pass out from lack of sleep.
As he walked over to one of the tables in the break area, William tried to ignore the stares of his coworkers. He didn’t blame them for staring. He looked awful and they probably thought he was going to fall over and die right in front of them. Well, that, and the fact that he had been jumping at the slightest sound. No matter what William did, he couldn’t calm down. Thankfully, Xander had backed down a bit, although he was still watching him like a hawk; however, his friend Buffy was another story. She had been skulking around ever since he had bumped into her. He could tell she was following him around, she thought she was being stealthy and sneaky, but he wasn’t stupid. Crazy and somewhat schizophrenic, but not stupid. William kept walking, past the stares and concerned looks to the table farthest away from everyone. It was partially hidden from view by a large stack of roofing tiles. He slid onto the bench and cradled his head on his arms. A few minutes wouldn’t hurt, no one would notice...
Buffy was worried. When she had first run into Spike, he actually seemed all right. He had looked good, well rested, and healthy. It was surprising how he’d changed so drastically just in the past four days. Now he looked haggard, worn down, and down right miserable. The look almost rivaled the crazy Spike in the basement look just minus the two toned hair. She had tried to follow him around the site, without being noticed, but she was failing miserably. She was following him, and he knew it. Buffy blamed the lack of good hiding places. The fact that she didn’t even get a dirty look just went to show how off he was. He also hadn’t even noticed her current stakeout point behind the cement mixer. The irony that she was now stalking Spike hadn’t escaped her notice, but she didn’t know what else to do. She had held off talking to him because she didn’t want to scare him off or make him feel weird, though with her covert stalker plan, she had probably already succeeded in doing both. Besides what on earth would she say to him? He didn’t remember her or anything else that involved Sunnydale. And to make things worse, she was obviously out of practice with the whole battle strategy thing. Though, she was becoming quite proud of her coping abilities. Obviously age had brought her some maturity because she was handling this Spike thing pretty well. After she had gotten all the information from Giles, along with Xander’s sarcastic commentary, she felt like she had a mission. It felt good. It felt right. So yeah, she was missing an actual plan, but weren’t all good slayers supposed to be spontaneous and think on their feet? Well that’s how she saw it, anyways. And maybe if she told herself that a hundred more times she might start to believe it. With a sigh, she turned her attention back to Spike. He was heading towards the lunch area with a wobbly kind of walk. This whole watching thing needed to end, it was time for her to take some action. Talky Buffy it was. Cue angsty music and let the soap opera begin.
When she reached the table he was sitting at, her determination wavered. She hadn’t been this close to him since she literally ran into him, plus he looked like he was taking a nap. He probably needed it, if looks were any indication. With him being asleep, Buffy took the opportunity to study him up close. Even when what she really wanted to do was to go up and run her hands through his hair and over his face. Geez, Buffy...one track mind. She tried to decide if she could get any closer to Spike without waking him up. When she had run into him before, it had happened so fast that she hadn’t had time to concentrate on details, but now with his face turned toward her, quiet and still, she had ample time to do so. She may not be able to use her hands, but her eyes still worked. She really needed to get closer, so she took the leap and took a few steps forward, slowly so she didn’t disturb him. She smiled... he looked so different, but also completely the same. His hair was a light brown now, with a slight curl. Buffy decided that she liked the bleached look better. Yes, it had been weird, outdated, and should’ve been hard to pull off, but it had worked for him. Another odd thing was the tan. The sun had been good to him, and his color almost rivaled hers. Under her close scrutiny she also noticed the dark purple bags under his eyes, and the occasional twitch in his shoulders. He almost looked like he was dreaming. While she was pondering her new discoveries, William gasped and quickly sat up. Crap, he was awake. Quick mind think...think. It took him a minute to gain his bearings but after a few seconds he looked up and noticed her. Double crap.
“Wh...what are you doing?” he finally stumbled out.
“Um...um...coming to ask you a question for Xander?” Buffy mentally hit herself. Like he would fall for that one. He didn’t answer immediately. He still looked pretty shaken up from whatever he had been dreaming about. Maybe he’d let her hug him. Probably not. After what seemed like forever, he finally got control of himself. She could almost see him put the mask on.
“What does he need?”
Thankfully, the few moments he gave her while he composed himself had given her time to think up an excuse and a plan. “He wanted me to ask you if you had found an apartment yet.”
“No, I haven’t. I don’t get paid until Friday, so I wouldn’t have had the money for the deposit, now would I?”
She decided for once to take the higher ground and not take offense at his snippy tone, and decided to play nice. “Well, have you started looking yet?”
“No.”
“Do you want help?”
“No.”
“Um, I’m looking too, so maybe we can look together.” Another mental slap, but she was getting desperate.
“Don’t worry about it, I can do it myself. Besides, I’m okay at my motel.” As he said that he got up and started to walk away from her.
“Wait! Don’t go! I really want to help you.”
“Yeah, I can tell. You know if you wanted to make friends, staring at me from behind a cement mixer isn’t the best way to go about it. So if you’ll excuse me, I have some work to do.”
Damn, he had seen her. Dumb Spike and his observy ways. “Well, you don’t have to be rude. For all you know, I could just be really shy and socially retarded!”
“Sure, Goldilocks. I can tell you’re the epitome of a wallflower.”
He pissed her off so much sometimes! “Listen, I’m new here, you’re new here. I just thought we could help each other out. Excuse me for trying to be nice.”
When she said that he stopped and looked at her with that intense, I’m-reading-your-soul look that Spike always used. Like he was appraising her and trying to figure out her thoughts and motivations. With a short nod, he seemed to have decided that she was for real. “Sorry..., Buffy was it? I haven’t felt well this week. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“It’s okay. I know I was probably weirding you out.”
“Yeah, you were.”
He was starting to warm up to her. Talk about an about face. This was turning out better than she had hoped, but she was going to tread carefully.
“I’m really sorry. How about we start brand new?”
He grinned a little and agreed. “Okay,” Buffy stuck out her hand. “I’m Buffy, a friend of Xander’s. I’m here visiting for the unforeseeable future.”
He grasped her hand and gave her a smile. “I’m William, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“That wasn’t so hard, now was it?”
“No, it wasn’t.”
This was of the good. Spike was smiling at her, she was smiling back, but she had no clue what to do next. Maybe she should bring up the apartment thing again. She looked at his face, saw the fatigue and decided against that. Real life stress was something that needed to be avoided at the present. After Willow brought her back, the whole having to pay bills and make serious life decisions had made the adjustment that much worse. She honestly thought that if she had been helped in that area, that year wouldn’t have been so bad. But she could make sure that Spike didn’t have to go through that, so she needed to find a way to help him forget about the real world for a moment.
“Do you want to go get some dinner tonight? My treat!”
“I don’t know. I’m probably not the best company at the present.”
He was going to try and get out of it. She was prepared for this. Xander and Giles had filled her in. He was all avoidy. But she had something they didn’t, Spike liked her. He always had, even when he wanted to kill her, he still liked her. Well, in a twisted I want you dead, kind of way. And William, on some level liked her just as much. He just needed to have an opportunity to find out. And hey, she was all up for that challenge.
“Come on, William. It’s a free meal. Who gives up a free meal? I’ll even let you pick” He was caving, and she was about to do the dance of celebration. She was also taking advantage of his fatigue and stress, and was using his stomach to get her way. She was pure evil.
“I guess if you’re letting me choose....”
“Whatever you want.”
“Mexican?”
“Sure. I love Mexican. Plus, all you can eat chips and salsa. That’s always a good thing.”
“Well, I guess I could be persuaded to eat chips and salsa.”
At that moment, Buffy wished she could give herself a high five. Guess she’d have to settle for a little bit more flirting. “Good thing, because I wasn’t going to take no for an answer.”
He smiled at her, again. She could get used to this.
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